This week, White House national security spokesperson John Kirby denied any US “involvement” in Israel’s intensive campaign of strikes against Hezbollah missile depots and military installations. And he urged “de-escalation.” The Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh similarly emphasized that the US military has “no involvement” in Israel’s Lebanon operations.

Last Friday, Kirby assured Israel’s enemies and the oh-so-concerned world that there was “no US involvement” in the Israeli strike on a senior Hezbollah commander, Ibrahim Aqil. “We’ll let the IDF speak to their operations. I am certainly not aware of any pre-notification (to the US) of those strikes.”

White House Middle East czar Brett McGurk offered lukewarm acceptance of Israel’s targeted assassination of Aqil. (After all, the US had a $7 million bounty on his head for his role in the 1983 bombing of the US embassy in Beirut.) But he followed-up quickly by distancing the US from Israel with a “that said” modifier. “That said, we have disagreements with the Israelis on tactics and how you kind of measure escalation risk.”

When pagers belonging to Hezbollah operatives in Lebanon exploded two weeks ago, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller also averred to every willing listener that America was “not involved” and had “no advance knowledge” of the operation.

“We’re collecting information in the same way that journalists are across the world to gather the facts about what might have happened,” he blathered. Miller added several additional sentences of protest to make sure that nobody could think – nobody at all G-d forbid – that Washington was on board with the beeper blasts attributed to Israel.

After Israel eliminated Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Teheran, John Kirby predictably prattled that the US “was not involved,” and “we don’t want to see an escalation.” Defense Department spokesperson Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said, “We’re trying to send a message, which is we’re looking to de-escalate the situation.”

After Iran fired hundreds of missiles towards Israel on April 13 (an assault that fortunately was scuttled by Israeli and US and other forces), US President Joe Biden warned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the US “would not be involved” in any Israeli counteroffensive against Iran.

Kirby, once again professing US innocence and peaceful intentions, was particularly verbose: “As the president has said many times, we don’t seek a wider war in the region. We don’t seek escalated tensions in the region. We don’t seek a wider conflict. We don’t seek a war with Iran. And I think I will leave it at that,” he added.

When Israel nevertheless conducted a limited retaliatory strike on a radar facility inside Iran, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken declined to confirm reports that Washington was notified of Israeli plans shortly before the attack. “I’m not going to speak to that except to say that the US has not been involved in any offensive operations. Our focus has been on, of course, making sure that Israel can effectively defend itself, but also de-escalating tensions, avoiding conflict,” Blinken said.

YOU GET the picture: America is not really backstopping Israel with American commitment and power in the confrontation against Iran and its terrorist proxies.

Instead, the Biden administration repeatedly swears on the graves of American mothers and before every international forum that it is “not involved” in Israeli military operations. And it is discombobulated by a de-escalation mantra that is hemming-in and handcuffing Israel.

This is based on a fanciful American dream that a hostage deal and an end to Israel’s assault on Hamas will lead to quiet with Hezbollah and the Houthis, calm in the West Bank and Jordan, and new US understandings with Iran. And magically also lower oil prices on global markets.

Alas, the Biden-Harris administration is still seeking to reset the region through conciliation with and concession to Iran, not confrontation. That is why Washington once again is quietly negotiating with Iran (reportedly in Qatar and Oman) over contours of a new nuclear deal, a deal that will launder Iran’s massive violations of all previous nuclear accords and allow it to remain a near-nuclear-weapons state.

This completely ignores the fact that Iran does not hide its overarching revolutionary and genocidal ambitions: to export its brand of radical Islamism globally, to dominate the region, to destroy Israel, and to subdue the US.

THE PROBLEM is that you cannot defeat evil by “riding the brakes” (per Prof. Gil Troy) or by “fetishizing de-escalation” (per US grand strategist Prof. Edward Luttwak).

What is needed is US determination to neutralize the Iranian nuclear juggernaut, to counter Iran’s hegemonic march across the region, and to thwart Iran’s proxies. Needed is a strategic reset based on overwhelming American power, on the presentation of a credible US military threat against Iran, at least. Not on weak-kneed US protestations of non-involvement in Israel’s wars, or soft understandings between Washington and Teheran.

In this regard, “de-escalation” is the wrong goal. From Israel’s long-term perspective – especially after the October 7 attack, Hezbollah’s entry into the war, and Iran’s attempts to ignite a third intifada in Judea and Samaria – escalation of the confrontation with Iran is inevitable, and at this point even preferable.

Indeed, it has dawned on Israelis and their leaders that this country faces a decade or more of a war of attrition against Iran and its proxy armies, and that an escalation in strikes on these enemies is necessary, not something to shy away from.

Israel cannot live with an Iranian “ring of fire” around its neck. Washington should not countenance this either. If there is a path to peace and stability in the Middle East, it requires enhancing the firepower of America and its allies, not redoubling the pursuit of “de-escalation.”

Alas, “Biden’s mania for de-escalation has prevented Jerusalem from deploying its assets to maximum effect in the current wars,” writes the intrepid American analyst Dr. Michael Doran. Worse still, “the Biden administration has postured the US in this war less as the leader of a regional coalition against the ‘Axis of Resistance,’ and more as a mediator between it and Israel.”

IN THE MEANTIME, Washington wags along with global media elites have reversed causality in their commentary on the wars that Israel is fighting. According to them, it is Israel that has “escalated tensions” with the Palestinians, “escalated conflict” with Hezbollah, “risked escalation” with the Houthis in Yemen, and may yet initiate a “major escalation” with Iran.

Notice the pattern: Wherever Israel defends itself against aggression from these bad actors, it is accused of “escalation.” Much like its equally annoying cousin “disproportionate,” the term “escalation” is a synonym for “unacceptable” Israeli self-defense.

On his Substack blog called “Clarity,” former Israeli ambassador to the US Michael Oren goes one step further. He draws attention to worrying new diplomatic language that essentially guts Israel’s ability to defend itself.

Vice President Kamala Harris, for example, allows that Israel can defend itself, “but how it does matters.” Israel can defend itself, but only if it does not kill too many of the bad guys. Israel can exist, “but we must have a two-state solution…. where the Palestinians have security, self-determination, and the dignity they so rightly deserve.”

Harris’s new boilerplate subjects Israel’s right to self-defense and sovereignty to conditions (like a ceasefire and a hostage deal and “urgent” Palestinian statehood), few of which realistically can be met in the medium-term future.

And as Ambassador Oren notes, the biggest “but” pertains to the way Israel defends itself. The implication of Kamala’s “but” is that Israel must remain defenseless unless it can defeat terrorists without causing large numbers of civilian casualties.

“Israel has the right to defend itself, but too many innocent Palestinians have been killed, children, mothers…” the Vice President exclaims. Since no one in Washington or elsewhere in the world has a recipe for defeating an enemy that hides behind and beneath civilians without causing significant collateral damage, this “but” effectively neuters the IDF.

The “how it does matters” condition also is rapidly gaining prominence in relation to the fight against Hezbollah in Lebanon. The liberal media already is accusing Israel of wreaking excessive damage to Lebanon and its civilians, and risking – you guessed it! – the feared and condemnable “escalation.”

Israel must wage war against this “but.” It is an insidious qualifier which conditions Israel’s legitimacy and strips Israel of the ability to defeat its enemies.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, September 27, 2024 and Israel Hayom, Septenber 30, 2024. 

Everybody who wants to see the West triumph over the radical Islamo-fascist camp led by Iran smirked and smiled just a bit this week when thousands of beepers simultaneously exploded in the pockets of Hezbollah leaders in Lebanon and Syria.

Such “schadenfreude,” German for satisfaction felt at someone else’s misfortune, is more than reasonable. 

In this case, it is, in fact, quite healthy and splendidly justified, especially after so many months of seeming Israeli helplessness in the face of thousands of Hezbollah attacks on Israel.

The crafty technological hit on some of Israel’s worst enemies – an intelligence-driven caper straight out of the finest and wildest spy novels – gave Israelis and Jews, supporters of Israel everywhere, and all reasonable analysts a glimmer of hope that Israel is getting back its moxie, its verve, its vigor, its ability to win over enemies.

The ingenious strike that targeted and humiliated Hezbollah’s operational ranks gave supporters of this country renewed confidence that Israel is determined to prevail over the Shi’ite hegemonic juggernaut and that Israel has plenty of effective surprises planned.

This feeling of triumph is healthy. That alone is a strategic victory.

MORALISTS have long despised schadenfreude as a guilty and cheap pleasure, a low emotion unbefitting of mature adults. But the emotions we are talking about in this case are neither cheap nor crude. 

There is no glee here, just a sense of justified comeuppance, of vindication, and relief.

This is why I don’t like the Hebrew term simcha la-ed that is closest in meaning to schadenfreude. It translates as joy or happiness at the misfortune of others – and that smacks of primitivism.

That also is why the English term epicaracy, drawn from Greek and meaning the derivation of pleasure from, or finding fun in, the suffering of others is inappropriate too.

Again, these are not the core emotions at work here. Nobody is enjoying the pain of Hezbollah or having fun in warfare, but rather celebrating a cunning and necessary Israeli military success that comes after a long period of setbacks.

Israel needed this win 

THE TRUTH is that Israel truly needed this win. Many Israelis have grown disillusioned with the Israeli military and the associated intelligence establishment, for failing to discern and warn of enemy intentions, for failing to find and target Hamas leadership, and for failing thus far to decisively win the wars against Hamas and Hezbollah.

The beeper bang-up is only a tactical win, but it suggests that Israel has turned the page – shall we say with a grin, turned the page(r)! – and is now embarking on a more offensive path to crushing Hezbollah, or at least significantly deterring it from further escalation.

Some Israelis also are disenchanted with the Netanyahu government, wildly accusing it of being a heartless government focused only on its electoral base, concerned mainly about just getting through another day in power – not securing hostage release or resolutely winning the wars.

The beeper bang-up suggests that, on the contrary, the government has been smartly planning for a long time for an assault on Hezbollah, and that more intelligent military strikes and diplomatic moves are possible.

Wouldn’t it be good if Israel could disable Hezbollah’s massive missile force with a similar cyber strike? Imagine an electromagnetic attack, a burst of energy that short-circuits the 150,000 Hezbollah warheads aimed at Israel. 

Yes, I would celebrate that with profound schadenfreude (even if it wrought enormous destruction in Lebanon)!

Many Israelis also have been crushed by the ongoing pressures of long-term war: the grief over fallen soldiers, the suffering of the wounded, the torment of hostage families, the dislocations of displaced Israeli families from the North and the South – refugees in their own homeland, the anguish of young families whose fathers have been away from home on military reserve duty for most of the past year, and so much more.

The beeper bang-up does not solve their problems nor does it alone revolutionize Israel’s overall strategic situation. 

But the ingenuity, muscle, and grit evidenced by the strike on Hezbollah does wonders for the Israeli national psyche and especially for those who are in despair.

It suggests that the many sacrifices being made by Israelis will yet carry the day and help overcome the enemy. 

There is some relief if not consolation in knowing that Israeli political and military intelligence leaders have a few more tricks up their sleeve and that the enemy is vulnerable.

Many Israelis and Jews around the world also have grown furious with that world. 

There is great rage at cynical, even malevolent Western thought leaders and politicians who have abandoned Israel by denying it weapons, falsely accusing it of war crimes, and voting to hand the enemy more land.

(See, for example, this week’s reprehensible United Nations General Assembly resolution passed by an overwhelming majority which essentially strips Israel of the right to self-defense and self-determination in Judea, Samaria, and Jerusalem. To its disgrace, France voted in favor, while Britain, Germany, Italy, Canada, and Australia shamefully abstained.)

The beeper bang-up doesn’t quell anger at the world but it does suggest some pushback. After all, the world (especially the US) has wrongly been pushing Israel to settle for yet another flimsy diplomatic agreement with Hezbollah that essentially would change nothing.

Israel will continue to shake Hezbollah 

So no, leaders of the world, Israel is not going to agree to “de-escalation” or to an agreement not worth the paper it is printed on that would leave the terrorist army’s arsenal intact and let it go scot-free after devastating the Galilee and Golan over 11 months of warfare. Israel is going to beeper-bomb Hezbollah and further rout it out, too.

In summation, by striking at Hezbollah so cleverly, Israel seems to have started back on the path to victories. Therefore, the resultant feelings of triumph as described above are justified, healthy, and very moral.

The self-satisfaction and derision of the enemy as expressed in so many memes and jokes (“If you have Motorola stock, sell short.”) plays a crucial role in binding our society together, especially since the pyrotechnical beating suffered by Hezbollah is not the end of the story. 

Israeli society will yet have to endure more painful levels of conflict with Hezbollah.

Schadenfreude over even temporary and partial subjugation of Hezbollah to Israel’s technological wizardry is a wonderful and worthy thing.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, September 20, 2024 and Israel Hayom, September 22, 2024. 

Jibril Rajoub, a senior Palestinian Authority official and convicted terrorist, once declared, “If we had a nuke, we’d have used it [against Israel] this very morning.” Rajoub said this on Al-Mayadeen TV, a Hezbollah-affiliated television channel, the same Hezbollah which last month fired a rocket at Majdal Shams in northern Israel, murdering 12 young children playing football.

Rajoub, who also heads up the ‘Palestine Football Association,’ is now leading the Palestinian campaign to boot Israel from FIFA, the football world governing association, having failed to do so on previous occasions in 2015 and 2017.

A man with seemingly no shortage of titles, Rajoub also serves as President of the Palestinian Olympic Committee and tried – unsuccessfully – to boot Israel from the Paris Olympics. But the International Olympics Committee (IOC) would have none of that, with IOC President Thomas Bach saying: “We are not in the political business, we are there to accomplish our mission to get the athletes together.”

Rajoub’s only mission however, spanning more than five decades in radical Palestinian politics, has been to glorify terror, incite violence against Israel and politicize international sports, by trying to have the Jewish state kicked out of every sporting association he can find, or in his own words “using athletes as an asset in our resistance and in our struggle.”

Rajoub’s first conviction for terror was in 1970, after he was sentenced to life imprisonment in Israel, for belonging to an armed group and throwing a grenade at an Israeli army vehicle. He served 15 years before being released in a prisoner exchange. Rajoub was subsequently arrested and convicted at least a further three times, on various charges relating to involvement in acts of terror and has spent at least two decades in prison.

With a bottomless CV of spewing relentless antisemitism, incitement and racial hatred, Rajoub has also called Jews “Satans” and Zionists as “the sons of dogs”.

Rajoub’s most recent mission to have Israel kicked out of FIFA, is based on the mendacious claim that Israel is committing “genocide” in Gaza. Of course, Rajoub fails to mention any role played by Hamas in the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, or their ongoing captivity of at least 115 hostages in Gaza, including women, children and the elderly. Nor does Rajoub mention that Israeli players and football staff have been among the casualties of Hamas’s ongoing terror.

FIFA seeks legal advice

In response, FIFA has sought independent legal advice to analyze and assess Rajoub’s request, with the final decision expected to be made later this month by the FIFA Council.

The fact of the matter is, there is no legal basis upon which to kick Israel out of FIFA, and this is no more than just the latest political stunt from Rajoub, as part of a years-long campaign to sanction Israel and expel or suspend it from international football.

Israel is not in breach of any FIFA rules or regulations, they are not impeding Palestinian football players from participating in the sport and there are no security considerations presented by Israel’s ongoing participation in FIFA.

If anything, FIFA should instead consider permanently banning Rajoub from having any official role in football administration, following engagement in repeated behavior promoting racism, derogatory comments and discrimination, which are strictly prohibited and punishable by suspension or expulsion, pursuant to Section 15 of the FIFA Disciplinary Code and Article 4 of the FIFA Statutes, as well as his wholesale violation of the FIFA Code of Ethics.

In fact, in 2018, Rajoub was handed a 12-month suspension by FIFA precisely for inciting attacks on football legend Lionel Messi 2018 ahead of Argentina’s match against Israel, which was subsequently forced to be canceled.

Instead of learning the lessons of his past misdemeanours, Rajoub has only doubled down on his racial hatred and incitement, including expressing support for the October 7th massacre and called Hamas leader and October 7th mastermind Yahya Sinwar a “pragmatic, patriotic, and realistic man”.

And this is the man preaching about ethics and fair play to Israel?

FIFA’s current flagship campaign, “Football Unites the World,” promotes the sport as a “global movement to inspire, unite … and bring people together, all over the world, to celebrate the beautiful game.”

In Israel, football truly plays a unifying role and serves as a beacon of co-existence in the best spirit of FIFA and international football, with roughly a third of all football clubs and players being from the Arab-Israeli sector. Any penalties therefore imposed on the Israel Football Association would directly impact one of the most exemplary venues for Arab-Israeli coexistence.

In order to indeed keep football as a force for good and politics out of sport, FIFA must once and for all give a ‘red card’ to Jibril Rajoub’s relentless campaign of hate against Israel, and dismiss this baseless campaign to exclude the Jewish state from “the beautiful game”.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, August 21, 2024.

At ten months distance from this country’s contemporary national catastrophe of Tisha Be’Av magnitude, the Hamas invasion of Simchat Torah 5784 (also known as the “Black Sabbath” of October 7), and as Jews commemorate the ancient Tisha Be’Av disasters (destruction of the First and Second Jewish Commonwealths in 586 BCE and 70 CE) – it is time for introspection.

This soul-searching is compounded by the current moment of vulnerability and unpredictability, as the country waits for an Iranian attack. Israelis question their own resilience and point wagging fingers at their political antagonists.

But has not this heightened capacity for self-criticism gone too far? Is it not time to reenergize Israeli national spirit with a little historical perspective? Might Israelis allow themselves the grace of recognizing the elemental goodness of their society, the essential morality of the Jewish return to Zion, their still-overwhelming successes, and yes, their still-overwhelming strengths?

What better moment than Tisha Be’Av to remind oneself of the Biblical warnings against the politics of defamation? Such politics have been tried before in this country with disastrous and tragic results.

What better moment than Tisha Be’Av to remind yourself of the manifold good works done by Israelis of all stripes and classes? These are acts of loving kindness and boundless generosity that range from everyday cancer care for kids to high philanthropy for the arts, from immigrant absorption to roadside assistance, from aid to war widows and orphans to support for displaced pioneers of northern and southern Israel.

And there are the enormous heroic sacrifices of IDF soldiers and their families, including tens of thousands of wounded and recovering young men and women.

There is great heart in Israel. The challenge is to maximize heart and minimize hatred.

Doing so requires a capacity for self-criticism and a hefty dose of humility.

Alas, in Israel these days humility is in short supply. The rich and the successful, the politically powerful and the ideologically super-charged, exude overbearing self-confidence that leaves no room for self-doubt, change, or compromise. Israelis are, as a rule, unrepentantly certain that their individual viewpoint is categorically correct, barring all others.

Moderation, nuance, restraint, and reasonableness have become orphan concepts in this country’s political landscape. The prevailing culture is kasach — unbridled, untamed confrontation. It is no wonder that there are no exact Hebrew translations for the words ‘civility’ and ‘subtlety.’ Israelis do not fully grasp the words or know how to apply them.

Yes, Israelis are divided by genuine ideological fault lines. But it should be possible to draw a line between policy disagreement and verbal political violence; between a legitimate argument and illegitimate character assassination; between legislation that is meant for the greater good and lawmaking meant to punish, demean, and crush the rival camp.

This is especially true at wartime. There is a specific Biblical commandment (Deuteronomy 23:10) to eschew “every evil thing” when going to war, and many sages interpret this mean avoidance of evil tongue, malicious gossip, treacherous mud-slinging, and debilitating demagoguery. The midrash (Vayikra Raba 26:2) warns that deletorin (informers, weasels, or slanderers) in wartime lead to defeat.

Nachmanides asserts that national unity at wartime and purity on the battlefield not only draws-down Divine powers from the heavens but even turns the entire “camp” (the nation or the army) into a holy vessel, into “God’s temple” – no less. Conversely, he cautions, evil speech “causes the Divine Presence to flee the camp,” to melt away from the Jewish People’s frontlines.

The famous spade that Jewish soldiers are supposed to carry into war with them to shovel away and cover up their feces (Deuteronomy 23:14) is said to be a metaphor for fingers in the ear used to prevent oneself from hearing rotten, backstabbing talk that undermines the war effort. (See Talmud Tractate Ketubot 5a and Midrash Sifrei 119.)

“For the Lord your God walks in the midst of your (war) camp to deliver (victory to) you and defeat your enemies; therefore your camp must be holy so that He sees no unclean thing and turn away from you” (ibid., verse 15).

Part of Israel’s post-October 7 national rehabilitation (which must begin now, even though the war is far from over) involves, as I say, some self-effacement and restraint.

It also requires rejection of despair and negativity, and the counting instead of personal and national blessings. After all, the Israeli economy is challenged but stout, families are large and supportive, and democratic freedoms remain strong. Indeed, in every survey, Israelis say that they are fortunate.

In my view, the happy Israeli mind also derives from a sense of historic purpose that still courses through the soul of the national community. And this purposefulness explains the sacrifice and commitment of Israelis. It is the crucial ingredient that make life in Israel tolerable and even exciting, especially for a people that has waited so long for its return to Zion.

So, on the eve of Tisha Be’Av, Israelis ought to recommit themselves to a vision of the common good; to just a little less hacking at each other politically; to a touch more tolerance in education, more honesty in business, and increased philanthropy; to more concern for the widow, orphan and unemployed; to more reverence for heritage and Zionist achievement; to shared destiny.

Israelis, especially their politicians, ought to make this vow for the coming year: “I undertake to restrain my tongue, because over-heated rhetoric can lead to tragedy. I commit myself to the patience necessary to withhold too-harsh judgment of friends, adversaries, and of the country itself. I recommit myself to Zionist and Jewish values, out of an overriding concern for Jewish Peoplehood – davka (specifically) at a time of vulnerability.”

“I pledge to emphasize the positive and play down the negative. I promise to highlight all aspects of Israeli buoyancy and act to reinforce Israeli resilience. I choose Zionist optimism over enfeebling elegy. We shall overcome!”

Published in The Jerusalem Post 09.08.2024 and Israel Hayom 13.08.2024.

Prime Minister Netanyahu’s meetings in the US this week with President Joe Biden, Vice President (and Democratic presidential candidate) Kamala Harris, and former President (and Republican presidential candidate) Donald Trump are certainly important. Certainly, as they relate to Israel’s immediate needs in confronting Iran’s Hamas, Hezbollah, and Houthi proxies.

But the shifting political winds on both sides of the political aisle in America make it clear that long-term reliance on Washington for all of Israel’s needs is an uncertain thing. It is time for Israel to diversify its strategic alliances, sources of raw materials and weaponry, technological partnerships, and more.

No, this is not a (ridiculous) call to ditch the US and seek alliances with China or Russia! The United States of America is and hopefully will remain a bedrock of democratic/moral, diplomatic, and defense backing for Israel for many decades hence. One surely asks G-d, as Netanyahu did Wednesday in Congress, to “bless the great alliance between Israel and America forever.”

But again, given progressive impulses on the Democratic left and isolationist trends on the Republican right, the passionate and generous backing for Israel in America of recent decades cannot be assumed to hold in all circumstances.

Simply put, resilience for the Israeli long-term requires broader circles and deeper reservoirs of support.

On the Democratic side, Kamala Harris could preside over a closer embrace than ever with the anti-Israel narrative that has swept “liberal” academic, political and media circles and become a potent political force in America. Harris’ demand way back in March for an “immediate ceasefire” in Gaza, when Israel was making substantial progress on dismantling Hamas, was outrageous from Israel’s perspective.

Her mollycoddling of the campus protests against Israel’s counter-offensive in Gaza is worrying too. Harris: “(The protestors) are showing exactly what the human emotion should be, as a response to Gaza. There are things some of the protesters are saying that I absolutely reject, so I don’t mean to wholesale endorse their points. But we have to navigate it. I understand the emotion behind it.”

Nor is it certain that a next Democratic administration will have the inclination or gumption to deflect the escalating international legal assaults on Israel, because Democrats seem to so assiduously believe in the “integrity” of international legal institutions, as well as “humanitarian” organizations (like UNRWA) – no matter how corrupt and disfigured they are.

Even before we get to a next administration, there is a danger that the current Democratic administration could move to unilateral recognition of Palestinian statehood – a move that would plunge a knife into Israeli security and diplomacy, and lavish undeserved gains on the Palestinian national campaign to crush Israel.

On the Republican side, President Trump and his new ticket-mate Senator J.D. Vance are both instinctively pro-Israel for strategic (and religious) reasons, and will defend Israel against assaults at the UN, ICC and other institutions that are hostile to Washington too. If it were up to them, they would supply Israel at present with every weapons system it requested, and they would not be too perturbed about humanitarian aid for Palestinians loyal to Hamas.

But isolationist (and ultimately anti-Israel) impulses are on the rise in Republican camp. At the very least, Trump and Vance do not want to fight Middle East wars on their watch. They are quietly saying to Israel: Clobber your enemies now, before we take office next year, and we’ll run interference for you afterwards.

President Trump will have other priorities (immigration, economy, China), and he will not be rushing to confront Iran and its proxies. His “sequencing” or prioritization of issues certainly won’t begin with Iran or the Palestinians.

And if/when Trump gets around to dealing with Iran or the Palestinians, I sense that his instinct will be to seek a grand deal with them – no less than Presidents Obama and Biden did, over Israel’s objections. After all, Trump sees himself as the grandmaster businessman, the great dealmaker, who by force of his personality and blunt diplomacy can bend people and countries to his will.

In the short term, this could work to Israel’s benefit, because the tools of pressure Trump might again apply – maximum crushing sanctions along with targeted assassinations against Iranian terrorist leaders, and diplomatic diffidence to Palestinian tantrums – move the markers in the right direction.

But in the longer term I fear that Trump will overreach for a “huge” win, for tantalizing shiny trophies of grand “peace” deals that do not truly end the threats to Israel (and the West), at Israel’s (and the West’s) expense.

And whatever side of the American political aisle one might think more problematic, there is the simple reality that political vicissitudes make even the best long-term assessments uncertain and strongest long-term alliances unpredictable.

CONSEQUENTLY, Israel must build for itself resilience across many platforms – in defense, diplomacy, energy, technology, and society. Resilience, so that Israel can act independently in the national security sphere; resilience, reflected in multilateral alliances in the Middle East and beyond that do not depend exclusively on Washington; and resilience, so that Israeli citizens have confidence in their future despite many threats and challenges that surely are going to persist.

Israeli resilience needs to be developed in four areas: defense systems (development and manufacturing, including munitions); critical resources (the supply chain for minerals and other scarce materials like steel); national security technologies (including AI, homeland and cyber security, quantum computing, and space technologies); and perhaps most complex of all – social cohesion (which mainly means better integrating Arabs, Druze, and Bedouin citizens, and Haredi Jews, into Israeli economy and national defense frameworks).

For example, in the armaments sector, Israel needs to be much more independent; an estimated eight times over the current manufacturing capacity of Israeli defense industries. Israel needs to indigenously produce 10,000 surveillance and attack drones, 200 Thundermaker self-propelled artillery guns, 100 Namer armored personnel carriers, and 50 Merkava main battle tanks – per year.

Israel also needs to self-manufacture 155mm artillery shells, and precision-guided missiles for the air force, in insane numbers. (This is especially true since Israel faces increasing restrictions on the use of US-supplied weaponry, and because there is a global shortage of such ammunition.)

Israeli resilience also means ramping-up and reinforcing services such as hospitals, electricity grids, water and sewage networks, and food manufacturing and stockpiling. (Israel’s electrical grid has almost no excess capacity. Yet it needs many layers of redundancy in case of enemy attack.) Israel must have at hand massive supplies of medicines, food products, and core industrial ingredients to last-out a one-year-long interruption in air and sea imports.

The IDF needs to grow by at least three divisions. That is 50,000 soldiers more, with tons of military equipment. A gargantuan increase in the training of front-line troops is necessary, especially armored formations. The Israeli navy needs more than $5 billion in new ships, submarines, weapons systems, and personnel over the next decade.

The Misgav Institute for National Security & Zionist Strategy, a leading think tank with which I am associated, has begun two massive projects to help Israel navigate its way forward in this regard. The first project called “Israel 2.0,” led by professors Gabi Siboni and Kobi Michael, is meant to lay down a vision for the State of Israel over the coming decades, following the collapse of last October.

The project is well underway. It revisits and reconsiders the conceptual foundations of Israeli diplomacy, security doctrine, internal security, civil-military relations, agricultural and settlement policies, constitutional and legal structures, majority-minority relations, immigration policies and institutions, and more. The project will offer a “reset” for Israel in these spheres and more.

A second project, involving thought leaders and professional advisors from different sectors, will commence soon, focused on building “robust resilience” across numerous platforms for the long-term; concrete plans for strategic endurance in defense, diplomacy, energy, technology, and society, as described above.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, July 26, 2024.

Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) are rich with Jewish national heritage sites.

It is the Biblical heartland. The physical record of the Biblical narrative lies in the ground with hundreds of known archaeological sites, and perhaps thousands of yet undiscovered sites, providing incontrovertible evidence that connects the Jewish People to the Land of Israel.

This is precisely why the Palestinian Authority is systematically destroying archaeological sites in Judea and Samaria, purposefully plundering and erasing Jewish antiquities.

This week the Government of Israel took a first step towards halting the wanton annihilation of Jewish heritage.

For the first time since Israeli archaeological activists conducted in 2020 a broadscale survey of some 300 sites under Palestinian assault, the government decided to back a bill in Knesset, introduced by Likud MK Amit Halevi, that would extend the purview of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) to Judea and Samaria – to manage and preserve historical sites.

The IAA is a globally respected professional scientific agency with considerable budget, real enforcement capacity, and a theft prevention unit.

Until now, archaeological sites in the West Bank have been the responsibility of the IDF Central Command and its Civil Administration (COGAT) – which have no bandwidth for this issue. The Civil Administration’s “Archaeology Staff Officer Office” is a department without clear policy guidelines and with no enforcement capabilities.

The Archaeology Officer hasn’t even managed to formally demarcate the boundaries of most heritage sites in Judea and Samaria, making it impossible to prevent illegal PA construction and agricultural projects which (again, purposefully) overrun these sites.

Archaic interpretations of the Oslo Accords by Israeli legal advisers have gotten in the way too. They have argued against Israel’s ability to intervene to protect Jewish heritage sites in Area B of the territories, despite the obvious and outrageous PA campaign to obliterate every Jewish/Israeli site possible.

The 2020 survey was conducted by an NGO called “Preserving the Eternal” and backed by Israel Heritage Preservation Center and the Shiloh Forum. The survey found that 80% of the important archaeological sites in Judea and Samaria (most of which date back to the Second Temple period) were damaged, with half of them in immediate danger of total eradication.

Sites that have experienced extreme devastation

The worst devastation was at sites in Area B, where despite technical Israeli security control (alongside Palestinian civilian control), there is effectively no Israeli control, no law, and no enforcement.

Among the prominent heritage sites in Area B that are subject to severe and continuous damage are Joshua’s Altar on Mount Ebal, the Hasmonean fortress at Tel Aroma, and large sections of ancient Samaria (Sebastia) – the capital of the biblical Kingdom of Israel.

Institutional PA efforts to destroy Jewish heritage sites (and Christian sites too, including many churches from the Byzantine period) are supported, alas, by an international network of foreign state entities that directly or indirectly fund destructive activities.

This is coupled with an international academic boycott against archaeological researchers working in Judea and Samaria, which impedes theoretical and applied research on the archaeological sites of Judea and Samaria, and which indirectly encourages their neglect and eventual destruction.

PERHAPS the most terrible story is the ongoing saga on Mount Ebal near Nablus, where a dramatic and large archaeological site has been identified from the early Biblical period.

The late Prof. Adam Zartal and many of his archaeological disciples have identified this site as the altar of Joshua (see the Book of Joshua chapter 8) where a dramatic ceremony reaffirming God’s covenant with the Jewish People was held after the early stages of conquest of the Land of Israel. Ancient Hebrew writing was found on an amulet at this site, along with unique burnt bone fragments and potsherds that underpin Zartal’s thesis.

Zartal began paying protection money to the local Palestinian landowner to protect the site, because it wasn’t demarcated as a heritage site by the IDF Archaeology Officer, and Zartal knew that the global sensation that his discovery drew would lead to Palestinian attacks.

But the land was sold to a Hamas-affiliated Palestinian who drew-up plans with the PA to pave over the site with roads and 24 high-rise housing units.

Indeed, in 2001 the PA paved a road encircling the site that destroyed part of the area. This included the grinding into gravel of part of the ancient stone fencing at the site, and then using the gravel to pave the road.

A large group of the most prominent Israeli archaeologists (including Zartal critics and anti-Biblical-narrative archaeologists at Tel Aviv University including many Israel Prize laureates in archaeology) twice signed a public petition to then-Defense Minister Benny Gantz and Prime Minister Netanyahu demanding protection for the “altar” site on Mount Ebal; to no avail.

In January 2023, a Palestinian building contractor started again to plow-up the area. An Israeli officer even found the PA plans to destroy the entire site inside one of the tractors in operation.

An Archaeology Staff Officer then acted to demarcate the site as a protected site, but the Civil Administration insisted that the line be drawn narrowly around only the “altar” without the surrounding plain where the biblical “swearing-in ceremony” may have been held and which could be an archaeologically rich zone. The excuse: insufficient legal authority.The battle continues.

Another infuriating story relates to the incredible aqueduct identified as King Solomon’s magnificent water system in Judea that runs from Hebron through Bethlehem to Jerusalem, including what is today termed “Solomon’s Pools,” southwest of Bethlehem.

This marvel of ancient engineering, 40 km. long, is described in detail in the Bible, and the description matches the archaeological findings precisely. The pools and aqueducts survived 2,000 years of summer and winter and many invaders and predators – until the arrival of the Palestinian Authority.

In 2022, the PA dug an enormous 1,500-dunam quarry pit at Beit Fajar right through a section of the aqueduct. The quarrying caused irreversible damage to the aqueducts, with some 100 m. of tunnel and approximately 2,000 m. The Government of Israel did nothing to stop this.

This is the place to point out that PA-directed destruction of Jewish heritage sites in Judea and Samaria is a gross and explicit violation of the Oslo Accords and all relevant international legal frameworks, including heritage preservation obligations under UNESCO (which the PA joined in 2011), and the World Heritage Convention (known as ICOMOS, the International Council on Monuments and Sites).

The flip side of this is that the government of Israel has been derelict in its international heritage preservation legal obligations too (in addition to its responsibility for Jewish memory and historical truth), under provisions of The Hague Convention and Jordanian law which still partially apply in the West Bank.

The Israeli Supreme Court in particular has been a comatose, regressive actor in this ongoing saga – foregoing opportunity and after opportunity to force the hand of the Israeli government into action against Palestinian destruction-ism.

The sad result to-date is truly annihilationist: Three thousand years of heritage on its way to near-complete wipe-out within a mere 30 years. This is a tragedy that must be stopped.

I salute the activist archaeologists and Ministers Bezalel Smotrich and Amichai Eliyahu, MK Amit Halevi, and others who have driven this matter to the government table. Clear policy directives must be issued to the IAA, IDF, Israel Police, and Israel Security Agency to prioritize the preservation of heritage sites in Judea and Samaria and to punish the PA for its belligerence.

Preservation and protection is a necessity so that something of biblical heritage remains for future generations. So that the land of the Bible is not erased by Palestinian aggression and denialism.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, July 12, 2024.

Reading the international press, and reading much of the overwhelmingly left-wing Israeli press, you inevitably get the impression that the threats to stability in Judea and Samaria stem from “settler violence” and settlement housing starts.

You wouldn’t know, couldn’t know much, about the real sources of instability – which are escalating Palestinian terrorism, surging illegal Palestinian construction in zones of strategic importance to Israel, and wildly out-of-control arson attacks.

The arson attacks in particular have become a central tool in the terrorist assault on Jewish life in Judea and Samaria (the “West Bank”).

Here is a reminder of some basic facts.

Attacks on Palestinian property and individuals committed by a few extremists at the fringes of a half-million-person strong and overwhelmingly peaceful community of Israelis who live over the Green Line – calculates to a level of violence that is lower than the level of violence by Israelis against Israelis that afflicts greater Tel Aviv.

And without meaning to diminish the ugliness of extremist Israeli attacks on Palestinians (about 1,100 incidences of all types a year), harassment and vandalism by some angry settlers pales in comparison to more than 5,000 Palestinian bomb, car-ramming, knifing, and shooting attacks a year aimed at killing Israeli civilians in Judea and Samaria.

(And of course, this super-pales in comparison to the 1,200 Israelis slaughtered by Hamas on Oct. 7 or the reign of terror inflicted on all Israelis by the more than 20,000 rockets and missiles fired by Hamas into Israeli civilian population centers over the past half year.)

Everybody knows how Nablus and Jenin (and Tulkarm and Kalkilya and more) have become dens of hard-core, Iranian-supplied terrorist groups, requiring nightly interdiction raids by IDF commandos with heavy engineering and air strike support. (So much for the Oslo Accords promise of a demilitarized Palestinian autonomous entity.)

THE THREAT of terrorist assault from the western Samaria seam line into central Israel is concrete, and already there have been scattered shootings over and through the security barrier into the Bat Hefer and Mount Gilboa areas.

Israel has been forced to eliminate 450 terrorists in Judea and Samaria this year in more than 60 brigade-level raids, and arrest 3,600 other terrorists or those suspected of terrorism. Some 8,000 Israeli troops, mostly reservists, have been stationed on regional defense missions in the area this past year.

As for housing starts, well there are about 4,000 Israeli “structures” (mobile homes, caravans, etc.) considered unapproved or illegal in Judea and Samaria.

This includes homes for which final residence permits are pending (“Tofes 4”) or homes where a garage or additional room was built without permits. But note: 85% of these “structures” are inside the municipal boundaries (what is known as the “blue line”) of recognized Jewish communities.

That leaves only some 500 structures that are, according to international critics of Israel, “changing the footprint of Jewish presence in Judea and Samaria.” (Not a great showing for “Zionist expansionism,” if you ask me.)

On the other hand, there are at least 90,000 defiantly built Palestinian homes that have cropped-up illegally in Area C of the West Bank in recent years, almost all of which can be considered strategic threats to Israel.

These structures are actively changing the map of Area C, purposefully placing Palestinians in areas that never before had an Arab presence, dividing the settlement blocs, encroaching on access routes (forcing the Israeli government to pave bypass roads to the bypass roads, which leads to accusations of land expropriation, etc.) – all in an attempt to prevent any future logical division of the territory into neighboring polities (for those who still believe in the wisdom of this).

A recent report by the Regavim Movement argues that illegal Palestinian construction seems designed to specifically conquer the Judea and Samaria security buffer zone, meaning the seam line adjacent to the security barrier that Israel constructed mostly along the Green Line over two decades.

Regavim’s mapping division has revealed three sample clusters of illegal construction: In the southern Hebron region in the vicinity of Ramadin, Dahariyeh and Eshkolot; in the Judea-Etzion region, south of Tarkumiyeh, Khirbet Khatta, Khirbet Adir, Sureif, Wadi Phukhin, Batir, Beit Iksa, Beit Laqya, Kfar Tzaffa and Na’alin; and in Samaria, in the northern and southern sections of IDF firing zone 203 near Kfar Thulth, north Tzofim, and a-Ras.

Regavim identified 7,675 illegal structures in these clusters, all within a one-kilometer radius of the separation barrier, all of them in Area C.

In the seamline buffer zone stretching from the northern tip of the Jordan Valley to Ein Gedi in the south, Regavim has mapped 16,866 additional illegal structures within a one-kilometer radius of security and border barriers.

Burning down Israeli farms

AND THEN there are the multiple brush and forest fires persistently being lit every day in Judea and Samaria by Palestinian terrorists in an attempt to literally smoke Israeli farmers, ranchers, and settlers out of the area.

Over the past months, firefighters have battled well over 1,000 fires in Judea and Samaria, many of them adjacent to Jewish towns and Israeli army bases, almost all of them certainly caused by arson.

This included difficult-to-control fires around the community of Peduel, on the western ridge of Samaria, and adjacent to Elon Moreh, an Israeli town of 2,000 people in the Samarian highlands; fires near Revava, Shavei Shomron, Karnei Shomron, Salit, Nahal Shiloh, Yitzhar, Givat Itamar, Tzur Harel, Oz Zion, and Kochav Hashachar; in Gush Etzion and the Jordan Valley; near the important IDF base on Mount Hazor near Ofra, near the Mount Kabir base above Nablus, and adjacent to the “Ofrit” base on Mount Scopus on the eastern ridges of Jerusalem.

And every single day, Palestinians and their extreme left-wing Israeli anarchist allies torch the grazing grounds of cattle in the central Binyamin and Samaria highlands where pioneering Israelis have established a string of some 100 ranches (in Hebrew: havot) – or as Western media and hostile NGOs call them, “wildcat settler outposts.”

The grass and brush that grows in the vast and mostly unsettled parts of Binyamin and Samaria are “natural gold” for feeding these herds of cattle and flocks of sheep.

Burning the pastures is outright warfare, designed to firebomb Jewish “settler sheep” off the land and drive settlers from the area.

This is not too different from the devastation caused by thousands of incendiary balloons and kites sent over the Gaza border by Hamas since 2018, firebombs that destroyed tens of thousands of acres of nature reserves and farmland in southern Israel. (Experts say it will take years to rehabilitate the burned farm fields in southern Israel.)

But who cared about the Hamas fire balloon blitz, and who cares about the manifold arson assaults in Judea and Samaria? Who cares about the dangerous and illegal Palestinian building juggernaut along the seam line and other strategic zones? The first is long forgotten, the second grossly underreported, and third shrugged off (or even supported by the European Union).

And in the face of exaggerated reports of “settler violence” and crassly misreported stories of settler “land grabs” – well, the reality of Palestinian terrorist violence and belligerence does not stand a chance of grabbing anybody’s attention in Tel Aviv, Washington, or Brussels.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, July 5. 2024.

Tens of millions of words will be spilled in newspapers and community rag sheets for and against the military draft of ultra-Orthodox men (haredi yeshiva boys), in response to this week’s Supreme Court decision mandating their draft.

I am not going to add to the scuttlebutt because I have exhausted myself over three decades writing about solutions (moderate solutions, I think) for patient integration of the haredi community in Israeli academy and economy and for a soft, slow draft of haredi men into the IDF and/or home front defense and rescue units and/or national service in civilian frameworks specially attuned to their religious/social mores.

Alas, I have reached the conclusion that no solution is in the offing. Despite October 7, despite the near-existential threat situation Israel finds itself in across seven fronts, and despite the attendant acute military manpower crisis – haredi leadership is not budging.

Despite the enormous sacrifices in dead and wounded and kidnapped and displaced, and despite financial deprivation and household disruption and emotional trauma experienced by so many Israeli families religious and secular alike – haredi leadership is not budging.

Forget the military draft of the ultra-Orthodox for a moment. How about some concrete expressions of empathy for the sacrifices and burdens carried at this time by the non-haredi Israeli public?

How many haredi leaders of any stream (Lithuanian, Hassidic, Sephardic) have you seen at any one of the many funerals for fallen soldiers on Mt. Herzl? How many significant haredi figures have shown up at soldier shiva houses to pay condolences?

How many significant haredi leaders – and there are so many of them in Jerusalem, admorim (“grand” hassidic rebbes), geonim (halachic geniuses), and gedolim (just “big” rabbinic leaders) – have quietly taken a minyan of their boys late night to daven (pray) at the Mt. Herzl military cemetery? After all, haredim have a thing about davening at the gravesites of tzaddikim (holy people)!

BUT NO. Aside from some extra Tehillim (ritual recital of Psalms in synagogue, as an afterthought), aside from some extra challah bakes, aside from a very few older (30+) haredi men who anyway weren’t studying in yeshiva or kollel and who, to abundant and distorting fanfare, drafted into rear army positions (basically working in their civilian fields but within the military framework) – the haredi community isn’t budging.

The haredi world is overwhelmingly cut-off from the war reality that “mainstream” Israel is living, purposefully and devastatingly so.

I am no longer sure that this can be changed, even if the most drastic punitive measures were applied (and they won’t be) – like a complete cut-off of government funding for everything haredi, from schools that don’t teach basic secular subjects, to yeshivas that don’t encourage national service, to the massive subsidies that kollel families enjoy in municipal taxes, health insurance, daycare and more.

I have reached the conclusion that the average haredi adult is a tinok shnishba bein haGedolim, a baby held hostage (mollycoddled) by the “great” leaders of the haredi rabbinic world. (This is a play on words. Haredi leaders somewhat forgivingly but mostly superciliously often refer to secular Jews as “babies held hostage by non-Jews and non-Jewish culture.”)

So I don’t see solutions on the horizon for the current constitutional, political, and social crisis over haredi draft exemption, even though I believe that there are pathways to a better place in the very long term (along the lines of haredi “hesder” yeshivas – see below).

And perhaps things will change when the current 90-year-old haredi leaders are replaced 50 years from now by today’s 40-year-old haredi intellectuals, some of whom are more broad-minded, better educated, and more rooted in Israeli reality. Maybe.

What remains possible, and necessary in this moment, is to defiantly distinguish haredi ideology regarding military service from authentic Torah ideology. To rigorously reject haredi dogma on this matter and debunk haredi distortion of religious sources. To me, doing so is no less an obligation for the sake of the “honor of Torah” than it is an emotional and social imperative.

THERE ARE four pseudo-foundational concepts that haredi ideologues cite in defense of their refusal to participate in “carrying the burden” of military service.

One is that rabanan lo tzricha netiruta (Torah scholars do not need protection) because they are protected, I guess, by the heavens. This is a distortion of the meaning of a phrase in the Babylonian Talmud, tractate Bava Batra 7b – which doesn’t at all refer to wars of defense, but to everyday policing tasks, at most. (See the writings of Rabbi Shlomo Yosef Zevin, editor in chief of the Encyclopedia Judaica, on this.)

Second is a reference to the famous, soaring rhetoric of the Rambam, Maimonides (Mishneh Torah, Laws of Shmita and Yovel 13:2) about the special qualities of the Biblical tribe of Levi, who by priestly service in the Temple – and by inference in devoting itself to Torah study and spiritual matters – is exempt from military draft.

Of course, Maimonides paen to religious and spiritual types is beautiful, but it was written as aggada (homily), not halacha (binding religious law). And who says that haredim, all haredim, are automatically “Levites”?

Third, is the aphorism that Torah magna umatzla, Torah protects and saves (Babylonian Talmud, tractate Sotah 21a). That all one needs for protection from the Jewish people’s enemies is a spiritual effort, whether through religious observance, charity, or study.

The modern haredi interpretation/distortion of this phrase is that students in yeshiva are operating “spiritual drones” that quite literally determine the fate of military campaigns more than soldiers on the battlefield.

Obviously, this is not at all what the Talmud meant. It is poppycock on so many levels, beginning with the fact that when haredi people get sick, they go to the doctor or the hospital in addition to praying or giving charity. The same principle applies on the national level.

Moreover, even if one accepts the concept that Torah study is a critical component of the Jewish people’s soul and purpose in life (– I do!), and that Torah study indeed “protects and saves” – who says that the Torah study of haredi 20-year-olds (who should be doing some national or military service) is a sine-qua-non necessity for heavenly cover? Might the Torah study of haredi kids or 45-year-old adults be sufficient and more welcome in the heavens?

Might it be that the 15 minutes a day of Torah study, squeezed-in between guard duty or combat sessions of my “Torah-true” religious sons in the IDF, is the Torah study that actually provides Israel with the protections of the heavens (and perhaps much more so)?!

FOURTH, is the concept of Teivat Noah (Noah’s Ark), that the haredi community writ-large is the Jewish people’s protected oasis of purity and morality, something that must be preserved for the overall good of Israel.

Haredi society is indeed an oasis of kindness and commitment, but maintenance of this oasis involves rejection of general education and gainful employment, disconnection from the secular public and the Zionist state (including army service), reliance on the dole (whether private charities or government largesse), and much more that is problematic.

The thinking here is so corrupt that it ends up justifying ignorance (of all knowledge outside religious texts), hatred (of other Jews), dishonesty (in business dealings with government), and abject poverty (which brings with it so many social ills).

As the undisputed Torah “giant” of his time, the Netziv of Volzhin, Rabbi Naftali Zvi Yehuda Berlin (1816-1893), wrote in his introduction to the book of Genesis: “God is honest and straight, and does not tolerate esoteric tzaddikim, holier-than-thou types, but rather prefers holy people who also walk righteously in everyday matters of the world, and who do not act in distorted fashion even though their intentions are for the sake of heaven. Because the latter bring about the destruction of creation and devastation of civilization.”

As for (justifiable) haredi concerns about the fact that military service at a young age would expose their youth to the possibilities of other ways of life and could erode the unique identity characteristics of future generations of haredim – well, yes, but deal with it!

Had haredi leaders been granted more wisdom from the heavens, they would long ago have founded their own hesder yeshivas (which combine Torah study with army service in special conditions) and saved themselves and the country a lot of heartache.

THE LATE, great Rabbi Dr. Aharon Lichtenstein, dean of the Har Etzion hesder yeshiva (who also received the Israel Prize for Torah scholarship), wrote 40 years ago that, “Hesder at its finest seeks to attract and develop men who are profoundly motivated by the desire to become serious Torah scholars but who concurrently feel morally and religiously bound to help defend their people and their country; who, given the historical exigencies of their time and place, regard this dual commitment as both a privilege and a duty; who, in comparison with their non-hesder confreres, love not Torah less but Israel more.

“Hesder provides a context within which students can focus upon enhancing their personal spiritual and intellectual growth while yet heeding the call to public service. It thus enables them to maintain an integrated Jewish existence, despite the conflict of values, lifestyle, and sensibility between bet midrash (Torah study hall) and boot camp, especially in a predominantly secular army,” he said.

“The halachic rationale for hesder rests upon the simple need for physical survival and the fact that military service is often the fullest manifestation of gemilut hasadim, the empathetic concern for others and action on their behalf, which is one of the three cardinal foundations of the world, and is the basis of Jewish social ethics. Its realization, even at some cost to single-minded development of Torah scholarship, is virtually imperative,” Lichtenstein said.

“In contemporary Israel, the greatest single hesed, good deed, one can perform is helping to defend his fellows’ very lives. And it is inspiring to behold.” May we behold such haredi hesed soon.

Published in The Jerusalem Post 28.06.2024 and Israel Hayom 30.06.2024

A cold, calculated analysis of Israel’s strategic situation will reach the conclusion that this country faces a decade of tough warfare on seven different fronts, mainly against Iran and its proxy armies. Enemy armies and militias are entrenched on Israel’s borders, with Iran actively arming and seeking to radicalize Palestinians in Judea and Samaria, and Jordan, too.

Full-scale war with Hezbollah in Lebanon, which is two days or two years away at most, will be an earth-shattering event in particular, bringing inevitable destruction of unprecedented proportions to civil infrastructure in Israel (as well as in Lebanon).

Neither the Israeli military nor home front is sufficiently geared to handle this grim reality. Therefore, the Government of Israel must embark on an emergency effort to significantly strengthen the IDF, and to mobilize the public in preparing for long-term struggle in wartime conditions. This requires punishing economic decisions and a change of mindset led by leaders with both grit and vision.

I believe that the Israeli public instinctively understands the dramatic inflexion point at which this country stands and the sacrifices that yet will be required to guarantee the country’s very existence – beyond the enormous sacrifices in men and material that already have been amassed over the past eight months.

And I believe that the Israeli public, young and old across all partisan lines, is yearning – screaming! – for national leadership that will motivate it to participate in an escalating national war effort despite the severity of the costs involved.

I am not talking about the many magnificent initiatives that have been launched by Israeli civil society organizations over the past year to support soldiers and their families, and to heal and comfort war victims. I am not talking about bar-b-ques for the troops, weekend retreats for war widows, or loans for devastated small businesses and farmers. I am not talking about the selfless activists who have rallied to advocate for Israel’s hostages or to back the government’s war goals against international pressures.

All these activities, from all sides of the political and social spectrum, are good and important, even heroic. And they certainly should and will continue.

Rather, I am talking about extreme moves to shift this country onto a true wartime footing, in order to rigorously prepare for the imminent, overwhelming challenges ahead.

I am talking about activating the Defense Ministry’s Supreme Emergency Economy Board to ramp-up and reinforce services such as hospitals, electricity grids, water and sewage networks, and food manufacturing and stockpiling. Israel must have at hand sufficient (again, massive) supplies of medicines, food products, and core industrial ingredients to last-out a one-year-long interruption in air and sea imports.

Also in need of colossal emergency augmentation: firefighting and rescue services. Far beyond the widespread forest and brush fires in Israel’s north wrought by Hezbollah in recent months, and wildcat arsons across Judea and Samaria perpetrated by Palestinian marauders, Israel must be ready for large-scale industrial explosions and fires at key infrastructure sites caused by precision-guided, large-ordinance Hezbollah missile strikes.

Israel also needs trained personnel to clear and dispose of massive amounts of wartime debris. According to disaster specialist Dr. Efraim Laor (the longtime Israeli oracle of emergency preparedness for earthquakes, and for chemical, biological, and nuclear strike), this could amount to 200 million tons of rubble, possibly contaminated itself, or that threatens to contaminate basic water supply and interfere with essential sewage treatment.

Then there is the military. The IDF needs to grow by at least three divisions. That is 50,000 soldiers more, with tons of military equipment. A gargantuan increase in the training of front-line troops is necessary, especially armored formations. The Israeli navy needs more than $5 billion in new ships, submarines, weapons systems, and personnel over the next decade.

Israel’s defense industries need to produce 10,000 surveillance and attack drones, 200 Thundermaker self-propelled artillery guns, 100 Namer armored personnel carriers, and 50 Merkava main battle tanks – per year. Israel also needs to self-manufacture 155mm artillery shells, and precision-guided missiles for the air force, in insane numbers. (This is especially true since Israel faces increasing restrictions on the use of US-supplied weaponry, and because there is a global shortage of such ammunition.)

This is a very tall, almost impossible, order, and it will cost hundreds of millions of shekels. Overall, it is estimated that Israel needs a huge build-up, eight times over the current manufacturing capacity of Israeli defense industries.

Besides the budget allocations for all this (and the concomitant cuts in civilian budgets that will be necessary), the Israeli government will need to mobilize the public to manufacture and man the above platforms.

It is time to raid the high schools, university campuses, and senior citizen homes for manpower; to press the entire Israeli public, young and old of all hues and stripes, into industrial and emergency service.

New factories and new rescue/response brigades need to be staffed by every able body. This inevitably will have to include segments of Israeli society that currently are underrepresented in industry and military.

And with political leadership that knows how to scare, inspire, and drive the Israeli public into the emergency super-structure and national crisis footing I am describing, I am certain that the public will respond with alacrity. I sense that Israelis are thirsting for such leadership. They are aching to be called upon for the Herculean efforts necessary.

SOME WILL retort that what I am calling for amounts to a near-complete shutdown of civil life in Israel, of education, culture, and leisure activities – and that this would be a major mistake. It would reinforce the assaults of our enemies who seek to indeed make Israel unlivable.

It would undermine our own self-confidence that despite enemy attacks, and alongside a painful war effort, everyday life in Israel proceeds apace with vigor, joy, simple pleasures (like vacation time), and with great accomplishment in all fields from science to music.

Nevertheless, it is high time for a national reset, for a forbidding awakening that marshals the public for the tough grind ahead. It is time to rally the troops – and that means all Israelis in all sectors and stages of life – for a period of intense national struggle. For sacrifice that goes beyond anything known to Israelis to-date.

Maj. Gen. Gershon Hacohen, who is the most ideologically rooted military thinker in Israel today, argues that rekindling an ethos of national struggle in Israel today – and acting decisively on this basis – is both essential and possible.

He recalls that David Ben-Gurion did so before and during Israel’s War of Independence in 1948. This entailed throwing Holocaust survivors off the boats from Europe into battle, the drafting of teenagers into work brigades and senior citizens into factories and fields, even the rationing of basic foodstuffs. It involved subserviating all aspects of the economy to the war effort.

After the Yom Kippur War disaster, Hacohen says, Israeli leadership also knew how to rapidly rebuild the military, aggregating every resource to do so – despite global boycott, mushrooming debt and economic depression, and without succumbing to too much legal and other government bureaucracy.

Two years ago, the leadership in Kyiv threw Ukrainians into national war mobilization too, mustering a large fighting force within half a year and equipping itself with the newest battle technologies such as UAVs.

In May 1940, Prime Minister Winston Churchill famously girded the people of the United Kingdom for an arduous path ahead. Before he drafted every single Briton into war service of one type or another, he warned that “We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind. We have before us many, many long months of struggle and suffering. I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat.”

“You ask, what is our policy? I can say: It is to wage war, by sea, land, and air, with all our might and with all the strength that God can give us, to wage war against a monstrous tyranny, never surpassed in the dark, lamentable catalog of human crime. That is our policy. You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: It is victory, victory at all costs, victory despite of all terror. Victory, however long and hard the road may be. For without victory, there is no survival.”

Israelis hanker for such leadership today. The emergency mobilization of society and economy described above is certainly necessary, and Israelis assuredly will be up to task.

Published in The Jerusalem Post 21.06.2024

This Jerusalem Day was so different and yet so familiar from last year’s commemoration. On the one hand, celebrations, ceremonies and our traditional march took place as usual. On the other, as with this year’s Independence Day, everything was tinged with trauma and sadness. We should reflect on the ways in which what was true about Jerusalem last year has endured throughout this devastating and tumultuous year.

Last year, as Deputy Mayor of Jerusalem, I presented encouraging statistics and trends regarding the Arab population in Jerusalem: I noted a significant step towards integration by Arabs in east Jerusalem who were increasingly graduating the Israeli matriculation (bagrut) exams, as opposed to the tawjihi Palestinian matriculation exams. I cited upward-bound statistics in social mobility trends, with the substantially-increased participation of Arab men and women in the workforce.

These positive trends are a point of pride for those of us who focused on Arab integration throughout the past several years on the Jerusalem City Council. We were and still are working towards the transformation of east Jerusalem into ‘Silicon Wadi’, a future hub for technology and innovation in Israel’s most multicultural city and its eternal capital.

On October 7th, Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar expected the Arabs of Jerusalem to view the scenes of death and destruction on their televisions with glee and to participate in the rampage. He could not have been more wrong. While two devastating internal terror attacks have occurred since October 7, the Arab population of Jerusalem, on the whole, has preferred to stay out of Hamas’s unholy war of terror. Hamas called for unrest at the Temple Mount and al-Aqsa Mosque compound in the Fridays of Ramadan as they do every year, and yet the Old City was blessedly quiet, bolstered, of course, by the strong presence of Israeli police and security forces to ensure safe worship for all.

We have long known that the majority of the Jerusalem Arab residents prefer to live under Israeli sovereignty and the Jerusalem municipality, rather than living under some future Palestinian state. The past several years of concerted efforts towards integration and the improvement of quality of life for Arab residents have contributed to the feeling of belonging amongst Jerusalem’s Arabs and to the relative calm of late.

Yet, our eyes must be open to the longstanding problem of hatred, incitement against Jews, and glorification of martyrdom that is endemic to the Palestinian educational curriculum. This curriculum is taught not only in the West Bank, but in Jerusalem as well, including in UNRWA schools, where it is even funded by the Israeli education ministry. I have long sought to convince the world of the poison of UNRWA. The extent of UNWRA’s corruption and involvement in terror was made undeniable when UNRWA employees dragged Jewish bodies into Gaza, when UNRWA teachers held Israelis hostage for months, and when UNWRA sites were discovered to be covering mass stockpiles of weapons and terror tunnels.

The world may call these bad actors or a minority, but we in Jerusalem must see the moral rot of UNWRA for what it is, recognize its role in radicalizing young Palestinians, including in East Jerusalem, and do our part to quash it amongst us.

It seems hard to imagine peace with our neighbors after October 7. Nevertheless, we must fully embody the model of peace that is Jerusalem’s potential. We must emphasize that deradicalization, and replacing the culture of incitement with a culture of cooperation, is key to building sustainable peace and coexistence. We must work to both deradicalize the bad actors, and maximize the shared productivity, mutual benefit, and high standard of living within our city for all its residents.

Many would have said — and indeed some still say, with their eyes closed to the everyday scenes we take for granted — that what we have in Jerusalem is not possible. Yet we know that it is. Let us improve, build, and continue to model Jerusalem despite the naysayers. With stubborn sabra determination, let us show our neighbors what coexistence look like.

Published in Times of Israel, June 9, 2024.