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How Hamas Uses Words and Manipulation as Weapons
I spent the first two weeks of the Hamas war in Jerusalem, with life punctuated by screaming air-raid sirens and the blessed booms of Iron Dome interceptions. Since then, back in Washington, D.C., I wish we had an Iron Dome device to shoot down the bad ideas and bogus phrases that play a crucial role in Hamas’ strategy to generate hatred of Israel, spark Arab and Muslim uprisings, derail Saudi Arabia’s normalization policy, and, ultimately, kill all of Hamas’s enemies (a category of which the Israelis are only a part). Let’s try to intercept a few of them.
Hamas knows it cannot defeat the Israeli army, so it fights an asymmetric war. It kills Israeli civilians and cruelly hides among Palestinian civilians so that Israelis, in defending themselves, get blamed for unintentionally killing those unfortunate civilians. The war aim is not military. It is to influence public opinion around the world. The internet is a key front. News stories, ideas, memes, and words are essential.
When American journalists fall for Hamas tricks, it is hard to tell if they are gulls or confederates. The Wall Street Journal now points out that Hamas runs the Ministry of Health in Gaza. The New York Times now explains that the ministry is “part of the Hamas government.” But The Washington Post continues to cite that ministry for casualty information, at times without acknowledging that it is an arm of Hamas. Do Post reporters really think that a group that organizes mass rapes and the knifing of babies is credible in reporting about its enemies?
The war against Israel involves bizarre contortions of political terminology. Consider the terms “moderate” and “extremist.” The Palestinian Authority (PA), which governs almost all the Arab residents of the West Bank and is reputed to be moderate, is backing Hamas in this war. The PA president denounces Israel for “aggression,” and the PA prime minister accuses Israel of “genocide” in Gaza. Having said America is “with Israel,” President Biden cannot be happy that these “moderates” are accusing him of supporting aggression and genocide. His enraged denunciations of the October 7 massacre suggest that it changed his views of Hamas. He now seems aware that the Palestinian extremists are even more extreme than he had previously understood. Perhaps he will see also that the Palestinian “moderates” are far less moderate than he understood.
In every speech, President Biden pleads for a “two-state solution,” implying that Israel could achieve that goal if it wanted to. But what keeps such a peace out of reach are the extremism, hatred, and unwillingness to compromise of Palestinian leaders in the PA as well as Hamas. All of this should be easier to discern now than before October 7 — and it all warns against giving the PA control over Gaza after Hamas is destroyed. The Palestinians need new leaders altogether. Otherwise, there cannot be peace.
Similar word games are played with the term “refugee.” Take Gaza’s Jabaliya “refugee camp.” The astute Bret Baier of Fox News wondered aloud why it is called a refugee camp, as it is full of permanent structures. Good question. The answer is that the United Nations defines “refugee” differently for Palestinian Arabs than for anyone else. There is one UN refugee office for Palestinians (UNRWA) and one for the rest of the world (UNHCR). Displaced people who are not Palestinian Arabs are refugees only until they find a place to live for an extended time, which is usually within a year or two, maybe three.
According to UNRWA, however, Palestinian Arabs from Israeli-controlled land remain refugees for their whole lives, and their children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and so on also qualify as refugees. By that definition, Tel Aviv is a refugee camp. New York too, for that matter. And London and Paris.
One of the most potent verbal missiles fired at Israel by its enemies is the accusation that it is “colonialist.” This is an especially gross case of the fraudulent manipulating the stupid.
Colonialists staked claims on behalf of their imperialist motherlands. Think of the British in India or the French in their African colonies. After Zionists began urging a “return” to Zion in the late 19th century, the typical Jew who came to build a Jewish-majority state arrived as a refugee, with little to no money. He staked no claim for the country he came from, and thought of that country as anti-Jewish and oppressive — by no means his motherland. He saw Palestine, which he called the Land of Israel, as his motherland. Jews are indigenous there. Arabs also think of themselves as indigenous, though it was relatively recently (in A.D. 7th century) that they colonized Palestine on behalf of the Arab Empire founded by the Prophet Muhammed. Since then, whenever Arabs or Muslims controlled Palestine, the land was a colonial province of a non-Palestinian empire based in Baghdad, Damascus, Cairo, or Istanbul. Who, then, are the colonialists?
And now, Israel is being pressed to make “humanitarian pauses” to ensure that food and other supplies make it into Gaza. Is there another case in the annals of the human race when a country at war was duty-bound to sustain a population under enemy control before the enemy surrendered? Wars have often been decided by which side most effectively cuts supplies to the other side. That was how the Allies won the First World War. Remarkably, when Germany surrendered unconditionally in 1918, there was not a single Allied soldier on German soil. The Allies won not by taking Germany over, but by preventing supplies from getting in. If a foreign diplomat had told British leaders that they had a humanitarian duty to feed the Germans before they surrendered, he would have been dismissed as clueless, if not crazy. Even so, Israel is allowing massive quantities of humanitarian aid into Gaza, though there seems to be wall-to-wall opposition in Israel to any kind of cease-fire, even one that is labeled a “pause.”
The promoters of pauses also commonly express fear that Islamophobia is surging in the West. The warning is better received if it comes from principled opponents of bigotry. But Hamas supporters denounce anti-Muslim bigotry while championing obliteration of the Jews. In any event, is there anything that generates hostility toward Islam and Muslims more than committing mass rape, burning live people, and butchering babies, at the hands of people who proclaim that they are acting in the name of Islam? Nothing will help the fight against Islamophobia more than the destruction of Hamas.
Let’s end on a hopeful note. People naturally wonder what will come after this round of war ends. The nothing-gets-accomplished-by-violence school argues that, no matter how many Hamas members Israel kills, other Palestinians will replace them, and in any event, Hamas’ ideas can’t be killed. But that’s not necessarily true.
Hitler’s defeat effectively ended Nazism in Germany (at least it has for nearly 80 years). Likewise, when the Tokyo military regime was destroyed, its extremist ideology went with it. And though Marxism-Leninism is still alive in China, the USSR’s demise buried that ideology in Russia and the other former Soviet states. Ideas, as a practical political matter, can actually be killed and buried, perhaps never to be resurrected. Another example, closer to home: The American South’s pro-slavery ideology died with the Confederacy and never came back. Ideological movements tend not to regenerate after they spawn wars in which they are devastatingly defeated. This is an optimistic thought for Gaza.
As Israel defeats Hamas — despite the terrorists’ rockets, jihadist ideology, and dishonest propaganda — Gazans have an opportunity to rise up and create a better government, not run by murderous ideological extremists. “Free Palestine” could be reinterpreted to mean that the Arabs there should be freed from the corrupt tyranny of their own bad leadership. Palestinian leaders actually interested in improving the life of their people would treat Israel as a partner, not an enemy.
Douglas J. Feith, a senior fellow at Hudson Institute, served as a deputy assistant secretary of defense in the Reagan administration and as under secretary of defense for policy in the George W. Bush administration. This article was originally published at National Review.
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Lebanon Claims It Is Replacing Hezbollah in the South
Lebanese Prime Minister-designate Nawaf Salam speaks at the presidential palace on the day he meets with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, in Baabda, Lebanon, Jan. 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir
JNS.org – Lebanon’s leadership declared in recent days that the Lebanese Army has begun replacing Hezbollah forces in the country’s southern region.
In an April 15 interview with The New Arab, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun announced that 2025 would be the year of the Lebanese state’s monopoly on arms.
Aoun pledged that only the state would have weapons, referring to the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF), and stressed this goal would be achieved through direct dialogue with Hezbollah, while explicitly ruling out steps that could ignite conflict with Hezbollah.
“I told the Americans that we want to remove Hezbollah’s weapons, but we will not ignite a civil war in Lebanon,” Aoun said, referencing a meeting with US Deputy Envoy Morgan Ortagus.
Aoun added that Hezbollah members could potentially integrate individually into the LAF but rejected replicating the Iraqi model where Shi’ite, Iranian-backed paramilitary groups formed independent units within the military. He asserted the LAF was conducting missions throughout the country “without any obstruction from Hezbollah.”
Hezbollah member Mahmoud Qamat, however, responded by stating, “No one in the world will succeed in laying a hand on this weapon,” according to Lebanese media.
Hezbollah Member of Parliament Ali Fayyad stated the group was open to internal dialogue but warned against pressure on the LAF to disarm Hezbollah.
Col. (res.) Dr. Hanan Shai, a research associate at the Misgav Institute for National Security and Zionist Strategy and a former investigator for the IDF’s commission on the 2006 Second Lebanon War, told JNS on Wednesday that statements by Lebanese officials and the activities of the Lebanese army are “unequivocally an achievement for Israel.”
But Shai warned that due “the weakness of the Lebanese army, the IDF cannot rely on it and must back it up with its own parallel defense—mainly through detailed intelligence monitoring and targeted thwarting of any violation not only in Southern Lebanon but also [deep] within it, including at sea and air ports.”
The fragility of the situation was highlighted when a LAF soldier was killed, and three others were wounded while attempting to neutralize suspected Hezbollah ordnance in the Tyre district of Southern Lebanon on April 14.
Hezbollah’s real intentions were also apparent when its supporters reportedly burned billboards celebrating Lebanon’s “new era.”
Most tellingly, the Israel Defense Forces is continuing to detect intelligence of illegal Hezbollah activity in Southern Lebanon, and acting on that intelligence. Overnight between April 15 and 16, the IDF conducted strikes against Hezbollah infrastructure in Southern Lebanon.
In one strike near Aitaroun in Southern Lebanon, an IDF aircraft killed Ali Najib Bazzi, identified by the IDF as a squad commander in Hezbollah’s Special Operations unit. Other recent IDF actions included strikes and artillery fire targeting a Hezbollah engineering vehicle near Ayta ash-Shab in Southern Lebanon.
Meanwhile, reports emerged suggesting Hezbollah was actively adapting its methods for acquiring weapons. Reports indicated a shift towards sea-based smuggling routes utilizing Beirut Port.
The Saudi Al-Hadath news site reported on April 8 that Iran’s Quds Force created an arms smuggling sea route that bypasses Syria.
Amidst these reports, Aoun visited Beirut Port on April 11, calling for strict government cargo monitoring.
Karmon expresses skepticism
Senior research scholar Ely Karmon of the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism at Reichman University in Herzliya stated, “There’s no doubt there’s a change in Lebanon, first of all on the political level— the fact that President Joseph Aoun was elected—supported by the West, the United States, Saudi Arabia.”
In addition, he said, “Hezbollah’s political weight in parliament and in Lebanon in general has dropped significantly after the blow they received from the IDF.”
On the other hand, Karmon expressed deep skepticism about Aoun’s stated path to disarming Hezbollah. Aoun’s statement that he “isn’t interested in coming to military confrontation with Hezbollah,” and that it needs to be a “slow process,” as well as his call for Hezbollah to enter Lebanese army units, should not be taken at face value, according to Karmon.
“I don’t really believe it. First of all, because traditionally, in the Lebanese Army, most of the soldiers were Shi’ites, for a simple demographic reason. And therefore, the integration of thousands of Hezbollah fighters or personnel into the army—certainly at this stage in my opinion—it’s a danger that they’ll take control of the army from within, after they’ve already for years cooperated with the army.”
He added, “We know, for example, that they received weapons from the Lebanese Army—tanks and APCs—when they operated in Syria in 2013, 2010, and they even presented them publicly in Qusayr [in Syria]. On the other hand, we also heard one article from a Hezbollah representative who’s on their political committee, stating, ‘Absolutely not, we will not give up the weapons!’ It is clear there’ll be opposition.”
Karmon said he was skeptical about Lebanese government claims about taking over around 95 out of some 250 Hezbollah positions in Southern Lebanon. Karmon assessed that Hezbollah and its Iranian sponsors would be cautious but that they would continue to try “as usual, to act and to bring in weapons, to prepare some infrastructure in case, for example, there is a crisis in the negotiations on the Iranian nuclear issue.”
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‘Tradition, Tradition!’
An image from “Family at the Seder,” from the 1935 Haggadah by artist Arthur Szyk (b. 1894, Lodz, Poland—d. 1951, New Canaan, CT). Photo: Courtesy of Irvin Ungar
JNS.org – How important is tradition in Judaism? Obviously, the answer is that it is very important. I mean, they even dedicated a major song by that title in “Fiddler on the Roof!”
How strong is the need for tradition in the spiritual consciousness of Jews today? Despite the effects of secularism, I’d venture to suggest that there is still a need inside us to feel connected to our roots, our heritage and our sense of belonging to the Jewish people. Perhaps more than any time of the year, Passover is the season when millions of Jews embrace their traditions with love, warmth and lots of nostalgia.
But for vast numbers of our people, tradition alone has not been enough. And that applies not only to the rebellious among us who may have cast aside their traditions with impunity, but also to many ordinary, thinking people who decided that to do something just because “that’s the way it has always been done” was simply not good enough.
So what if my grandfather did it? My grandfather rode around in a horse and buggy! Must I give up my car for a horse just because my Zaidy rode a horse? And if my Bubbie never got a university degree, why shouldn’t I? Just because my grandparents practiced certain Jewish traditions, why must I? Perhaps those traditions are as obsolete as the horse and buggy?
There are masses of Jews who think this way and who will not be convinced to behave Jewishly just because their grandparents did.
We need to tell them why their grandparents did it. They need to understand that their grandparents’ traditions were not done just for tradition’s sake, but there was a very good reason why their forbears practiced those traditions. And those very same reasons and rationales still hold good today. There is, in fact, no such thing as “empty ritual” in Judaism. Everything has a reason, and a good one, too.
Too many young people were put off by tradition because some cheder or Talmud Torah teacher didn’t take their questions seriously. They were silenced with a wave of the hand, a pinch of the ear, the classic “when you get older, you’ll understand,” or the infamously classic, “just do as you’re told.”
There are answers. There have always been answers. We may not have logical explanations for tsunamis and other tzuris, but all our traditions are founded on substance and have intelligible, credible underpinnings. If we seek answers, we will find them in abundance, including layers and layers of meaning, from the simple to the symbolic to the philosophical and even mystical.
The seventh day of Passover recalls the “Song of the Sea” sung by Moses and the Jewish people following the splitting of the sea and their miraculous deliverance from the Egyptian armies. Early on, we find the verse, “This is my God and I will glorify Him, the God of my fathers, and I will exalt Him.”
The sequence is significant. First comes “my God,” and only thereafter “the God of my fathers.” In the Amidah prayer, the silent devotion, which is the apex of our daily prayers, we begin addressing the “Almighty, as our God and the God of our fathers … Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” Again, “our God” comes first. So while the God of our fathers, i.e., tradition, most definitely plays a very important role in Judaism, an indispensable prerequisite is that we must make God ours, personally. Every Jew must develop a personal relationship with God. We need to understand the reasons and the significance of our traditions lest they be mistaken for empty ritual to be discarded by the next generation.
Authentic Judaism has never shied away from questions. Questions have always been encouraged and formed a part of our academic heritage. Every page of the Talmud is filled with questions and answers. You don’t have to wait for the Passover seder to ask a question.
When we think, ask and find answers to our faith, the traditions of our grandparents become alive, and we understand fully why we should make them ours. Once a tradition has become ours and we realize that this very same practice has been observed uninterruptedly by our ancestors throughout the generations, then tradition becomes a powerful force that can inspire us forever.
The seders we celebrated at the beginning of Passover are among the most powerful in our faith. They go back to our ancestors in Egypt, where the very first seder was observed. How truly awesome is it that we are still practicing these same traditions more than 3,300 years later!
Our traditions are not empty. They are rich and meaningful and will, please God, be held on to preciously for generations to come.
With acknowledgments to Chabad.org.
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Thousands of Protesters Rally Against Trump Across US
“Protect Migrants, Protect the Planet” rally in New York City, U.S., April 19, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Caitlin Ochs
Thousands of protesters rallied in Washington and other cities across the US on Saturday to voice their opposition to President Donald Trump’s policies on deportations, government firings, and the wars in Gaza and Ukraine.
Outside the White House, protesters carried banners that read “Workers should have the power,” “No kingship,” “Stop arming Israel” and “Due process,” media footage showed.
Some demonstrators chanted in support of migrants whom the Trump administration has deported or has been attempting to deport while expressing solidarity with people fired by the federal government and with universities whose funding is threatened by Trump.
“As Trump and his administration mobilize the use of the US deportation machine, we are going to organize networks and systems of resistance to defend our neighbors,” a protester said in a rally at Lafayette Square near the White House.
Other protesters waved Palestinian flags while wearing keffiyeh scarves, chanting “free Palestine” and expressing solidarity with Palestinians killed in Israel’s war in Gaza.
Some demonstrators carried symbols expressing support for Ukraine and urging Washington to be more decisive in opposing Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine.
Since his January inauguration, Trump and his billionaire ally, Elon Musk, have gutted the federal government, firing over 200,000 workers and attempting to dismantle various agencies.
The administration has also detained scores of foreign students and threatened to stop federal funding to universities over diversity, equity and inclusion programs, climate initiatives and pro-Palestinian protests. Rights groups have condemned the policies.
Near the Washington Monument, banners from protesters read: “hate never made any nation great” and “equal rights for all does not mean less rights for you.”
Demonstrations were also held in New York City and Chicago, among dozens of other locations. It marked the second day of nationwide demonstrations since Trump took office.
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