Following Hamas’s October 7 massacre, world leaders released statements of support for Israel, iconic buildings were lit up in blue and white, and Jewish communities rushed to donate to Israel’s first responders. The question that now must be asked is: beyond statements of solidarity, what can policy-makers, private sector actors, and civil society do to support the efforts to defeat Hamas and return the children, women, and men being held hostage in Gaza?

The first step is placing international pressure on the countries that support and fund Hamas, so that these countries press Hamas to release the hostages, and in the long term, end their support for the terrorist organization. These countries include Qatar, Turkey, Algeria, Malaysia, and Kuwait.

Qatar for example has been hosting Hamas headquarters since at least 2012, while sending an estimated 1.5 billion dollars to Gaza over the past decade, the vast majority of which reached Hamas, its operatives, and employees. On October 18, 2023, the US placed sanctions on a Qatar-based Hamas operative involved in the transfer of tens of millions of dollars to Hamas. Qatar’s Al Jazeera media outlet has been a central mouthpiece for Hamas propaganda. At the same time, in 2022, the United States recognized Qatar as a major non-NATO ally.

Similarly, Turkey, beyond simply hosting Hamas leaders and offices, granted senior Hamas officials such as Ismail Haniyeh and Saleh al-Arouri, Turkish passports, so that they could travel freely around the world. This despite the fact that Turkey is a member of NATO, and is seeking to purchase advanced weapons systems from the US.

Hamas’s sponsors also include Iran, a country against which there is already an ongoing campaign to promote sanctions for its promotion of terror, nuclear program, support for Russia’s war against Ukraine, and domestic repression.

Governments and parliaments should send a clear message to Hamas sponsors with extensive Western ties, like Qatar and Turkey, that they can no longer enjoy warm relations with the West while supporting an ISIS-like terrorist group holding Israeli, American, and European citizens hostage.

Further development of economic and military ties with these countries should be reexamined, including exploring alternatives to the purchase of Qatari liquid natural gas. All financial and commercial entities in these countries involved in transferring funds to Hamas should be sanctioned.

Removing US bases from Qatar

The US should also begin examining the transfer of military installations and assets from Qatar to Saudi Arabia, which would strengthen a US ally against Iran, help block inroads made by China into Saudi Arabia, and advance regional peace.

Private sector companies, civil society actors and academic institutions should refuse to take part in conferences or events hosted by Qatar, and refuse Qatari sponsorships until Hamas releases all of its hostages and Qatar shuts down Hamas’ HQ. Lawsuits should be filed in every relevant jurisdiction by the victims of Hamas terror targeting all countries that have provided Hamas financial or logistical support.

It is important to note that Hamas is not apathetic to the worldwide condemnation of its massacres, as seen by steps the group has taken regarding public relations damage control, including through media appearances and the release of two American-Israeli hostages. International pressure on Hamas, highlighting its ISIS-like barbarity, must be intensified.

German and French prosecutors have already opened investigations into Hamas for its crimes against citizens of their countries. Other countries whose nationals are being held should follow suit.

While many countries have designated Hamas as a terrorist organization, others have not. These include Switzerland, Norway, India, Turkey, and the Philippines. In 2018, a US resolution at the UN Security Council to label Hamas’s actions as terrorism was supported only by the US, with European countries abstaining. In light of Hamas’ large-scale, sadistic atrocities, there can no longer be any excuse for not designating Hamas as a terrorist entity. Parliamentary human rights committees can be used as a forum for highlighting Hamas’s brutal human rights violations.

Where terrorist designations have been made, all available tools should be used to sanction any and all actors associated with Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups, including Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

As noted, on October 18, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control “imposed sanctions on ten key Hamas members, operatives, and financial facilitators” in Gaza, Sudan, Turkey, Algeria, and Qatar. These actions targeted operatives managing Hamas’s investment portfolio, facilitating the transfer of funds, and a Gaza-based virtual currency exchange. It should be noted that Hamas has made extensive use of cryptocurrencies and platforms, which should be sanctioned as well.

Following Hamas’s massacre, Austria, Denmark, Germany, and Sweden announced that they would review their funding to the Palestinians. Western funds which serve to strengthen Hamas in Gaza, such as funding for UNRWA’s Gaza operations, or which serve to enable terror incitement in the Palestinian education system and through the Palestinian Authority’s “pay to slay” system, should be ended immediately.

The time for action is now. Hamas has committed the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust. There is wide consensus in the West that Hamas is equivalent to, or worse than ISIS. Every government, parliament, commercial body, civil society organization, and individual must seize the opportunity to contribute to the defeat of Hamas and the release of the hostages.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, October 24, 2023.

Israeli defense and diplomatic policies will never be the same. The jihadist invasion of Israel has shattered as many illusions as lives. The Simchat Torah Hamas massacres have wiped-out layers upon layers of conventional wisdom. They have smashed to smithereens decades of false paradigms and erroneous strategic thinking.

So many policies and paradigms have been proven to be faulty, phantastic, illusory, and grotesque – and suicidally so. Their shattering is ultimately, albeit tragically, a good thing. The bad policies and false paradigms will be defiantly replaced by life-affirming policies.

Shattered  is the belief that the Islamic Republic of Iran and its genocidal-towards-Israel proxy armies like Hamas and Hezbollah can be coopted or contained. They must be crushed. Palestinians and Lebanese too must be freed from the clutches of these terror organizations.

Shattered  is the theory that with responsibility for the two million residents of Gaza, Hamas would become more “responsible,” “moderate” or “mature.” It didn’t.

Shattered  is the idea that Israel can tolerate diplomatic relations with countries like Turkey and Qatar who host Hamas leaders in luxury and safety. Israel should freeze ties to these countries and to other nations that coddle or excuse Hamas. They should lose US support and economic ties too.

Shattered  is the economic peace hypothesis that postulated prosperity for Palestinians as an antidote to radical Islamic ideology and genocidal education. The millions or even billions of economic development dollars showered by the world on Palestinians in Gaza, and funneled in suitcases into Gaza by Qatar, only strengthened the monster. All funding avenues for Hamas must be cut.

Shattered  is the notion that Israel can “shrink the conflict” or “disincentivize violence” by gifting Hamas tens of thousands of work permits in Israel for its populace, or by facilitating the transfer into Gaza of tens of thousands of tons of civilian and humanitarian goods every day, or by selling gas, electricity and water to a Hamas government. Israel must terminate any responsibility for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip until Hamas is eliminated.

Shattered  is the mealy-mouthed Western media and diplomatic practice of calling Hamas a “militant” group and its armed forces “militias.” Hamas is ISIS, and its stormtroopers are Nazi-like Einsatzgruppen. Israel should censure diplomats or journalists who brazenly still use such spineless terms.

Shattered  is the misconception that the Palestinian conflict with Israel is about “illegal settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories,” meaning Israeli towns in Gaza or Judea and Samaria. The conflict is about every Jewish “settlement” in the Land of Israel including Kibbutz Beeri, Kfar Aviv, Netiv HaAsara, Kissufim, Sderot, and Kerem Shalom. And Tel Aviv, Beersheba, Haifa, and Jerusalem. And any place that Zionists dare to live in their ancestral homeland.

Time to discard the canard about West Bank settlements being the obstacle to peace. The obstacle to peace is barbaric radical Islam and annihilationist Palestinian nationalism.

Shattered  for the foreseeable future is the “two-state solution,” the concept that a Palestinian state or states alongside Israel could bring stability, security, and success to all. Hamas has convincingly destroyed the always-flimsy but until-now deemed credible supposition that such a solution would be best.

At least in this generation, Israel will not be able to tolerate a full-fledged Palestinian state. Any such state, say in the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority currently run by Mahmoud Abbas, could and would likely become a Hamas state.

Shattered  is the head-in-the-sand assumption that one day Mahmoud Abbas will ripen into a partner for peace. He hasn’t uttered one dash of distaste, never mind a clear condemnation, of the Hamas attack this week. Let’s face it, there doesn’t seem to be today any real difference in the goals of the Hamas and Fatah movements.

Shattered  is the Obama-Biden approach of affirming Iran’s “legitimate” right to a dominant role in the region, including the right to nuclear enrichment, alongside so-called “recognized Iranian interests” in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen, and Palestinian areas. This is what Obama excused as a worthy “realignment” in the region that takes Iran into positive account, and which idiotically and outrageously assumed Iran would be a status quo power. Maybe the US can re-freeze the $6 billion in grease it just slathered onto the Iranian war machine.

Shattered  spectacularly is IDF reliance on technology to guarantee border security, from sensors, satellites and drones to souped-up fences, sophisticated underground barriers, and pioneering missile defense systems.

Just think of all those smart young women soldiers sitting at their computer monitors in the IDF Gaza regional command headquarters tracking every fox and enemy foxhole; “tatzpitaniot” (lookouts) that have been lauded by Israel’s generals and acclaimed in hundreds of adoring media features. They were swiftly slaughtered by Hamas in the first hour of the invasion, and their technologies easily neutralized.

Only troops shooting real bullets that decimate the enemy can guarantee security. Israel needs more boots on the ground with lethal firepower on offensive operations.

Shattered  is the assumption that occasional “mowing the grass” can keep the enemy at bay; meaning that a few, brief rounds of pinpoint surgical strikes on Hamas weapons depots that don’t dare to also hit adjacent structures – suffice to keep the organization weak and deterred. Apparently not. So no more sporadic tiptoeing through the tulips with insanely meticulous surgical strikes.

Shattered  is the hope that the world ever will apply “international humanitarian law” and the so-called “laws of war” to Israel’s enemies. Shattered is the notion that these much ballyhooed but tendentious frameworks can any longer be allowed to tie Israel’s hands behind its back when the IDF goes on the offensive.

Israel must not respond just “proportionately” to Hamas. It must and will apply disproportionate force to eliminate the enemy. Iran, Hamas, and their sycophants in Europe will throw the International Criminal Court at Israel, but so be it. Damn those biased, hypocritical international lawyers and judges who know only to criminalize Israel.

Remember that these big-headed judges condemned Israel for using force to stop Hamas’ previous attempts to rush the border. In their eyes, every Israeli response to the threat from Hamas was illegal, immoral, and disproportionate.

Shattered  is always-apologize disposition of Israelis; the engrained Israeli need to make excuses for and prettify Israeli military operations; the subjugation of security decision-making to Israel’s desire for a good “image” globally and the limitations of noble “hasbara” or polite public diplomacy. No more.

Israel is now fighting for its life against depraved enemies seeking its extermination and who are willing to rape and mutilate their way through every Israeli living room. Israel cannot afford to play nicely in the sandbox to protect its “image” in the liberal salons of Paris or New York. No more apologizing.

Not shattered  by Hamas is the hope for, and near-term possibility of, broad Middle East peace between Israel and the most important Arab states. The imminent demise of Hamas will make peace all-the-more possible and worthwhile.

Not shattered  by Hamas are Israel’s friends around the world – like US President Joe Biden, who this week offered the most stirring defense of Israel alongside clarion-clear statements of moral principle and concrete support.

Not shattered  by Hamas is the global Jewish Diaspora – which mobilized this week to support Israel, despite its differences with the Israeli mainstream on identity issues and policy matters. Jews of the world are Israel’s strategic reserve, and Israel is the ultimate guarantor of their security and vitality.

Not shattered  by Hamas is the determination of the State of Israel to protect its citizenry, and the bravery of the people of Israel in this regard. The rate by which Israelis are reporting to emergency military reserve duty stands at well over 150%, meaning that some units have more soldiers than they can absorb and equip. The extent of mobilization by volunteer civil society organizations is overwhelming and uplifting too.

“U-mi ke-amcha Yisrael, goy echad ba’aretz.” There is no match for the noble Jewish People, guided by an astral calculus and a hidden Divine hand, unique in the world!

Not shattered by Hamas is “Netzach Yisrael,” the eternity of Israel, the age-old stamina and spirit of the Jewish People; the grit to survive and thrive and the drive to reclaim the ancient Jewish homeland; the willpower to make the greatest achievements in Zion, and from Zion to contribute to the world.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, October 13, 2023; and Israel Hayom, October 15, 2023.