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The Jewish left is grappling, sometimes painfully, with how to respond to Hamas’ attack
(JTA) — In his first posts about Hamas’ massacre of Israeli civilians, progressive writer Joshua Leifer expressed horror at the accounts of atrocities that were emerging from southern Israel.
He also lamented the range of progressive organizations and figures who appeared to condone or even celebrate the attack — leaving him with “a deep sense that the left abroad has lost the values it was supposed to stand for.”
“I thought we were leftists because we wanted a world without war, torture, the killing of families & children in their beds,” Leifer posted on X. “Self-professed human rights defenders, even would-be colleagues are celebrating and glorifying unspeakable acts that violate the most basic elements of human life. I feel sick.”
The thread of posts — which Leifer later expanded into an article for the left-wing journal Dissent — struck a chord among other Jews on the left. The progressive Jewish writer Peter Beinart shared Leifer’s thread, saying it “captures my feelings exactly.”
Some progressive figures and organizations, from local Black Lives Matter chapters to the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, have appeared to condone or even celebrate the massacre — which killed 1,300 people, largely civilians — as an act of resistance against an illegal occupation. Some Jewish leftists have mourned the slaughter while placing the blame squarely on Israel.
And others who have also spent their careers opposing Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory are now decrying their ideological allies’ refusal to condemn the killing of civilians — in some cases their friends or relatives.
“For the people who are most connected to people in Israel, this is a really, really hard and disheartening time,” said Arielle Angel, editor-in-chief of the progressive magazine Jewish Currents. “Because what they see is people totally dismissing the value of the lives of people that they know and that they think should not be considered collateral damage.”
At the same time, Angel said, Jewish leftists are confronting another tension: They are reckoning with the mass killing of Israeli civilians by Hamas — and also continue to oppose Israel’s occupation and airstrikes on the Gaza Strip, which the terror group governs.
“I think this is a new moment,” she said. “If you’re talking to American Jewish leftists, there’s a split in terms of where their energy is going right now.”
She added later, “I’m very scared about the future of the left in this moment.”
Some on the left, including at least one Jewish writer, openly celebrated the attack shortly after it began.
On Saturday, as Hamas attackers were still in Israel, Rivkah Brown, a journalist for the U.K.’s Novara Media, posted on X that the assault should mark “a day of celebration for supporters of democracy and human rights worldwide, as Gazans break out of their open-air prison.” The New York City Democratic Socialists of America promoted a rally expressing “solidarity with the Palestinian people and their right to resist 75 years of occupation and apartheid.”
And in the immediate wake of the massacre, some left-wing Jewish organizations said blame lay with Israel. IfNotNow, which opposes Israel’s occupation, said of the murdered Israelis that “their blood is on the hands of the Israeli government, the US government which funds and excuses their recklessness, and every international leader who continues to turn a blind eye to decades of Palestinian oppression.”
Jewish Voice for Peace, an anti-Zionist group, acknowledged the “unprecedented assault” and the hundreds of Israeli casualties in an Oct. 7 statement that did not mention Hamas.
“Israeli apartheid and occupation — and United States complicity in that oppression — are the source of all this violence,” the statement said. “Inevitably, oppressed people everywhere will seek — and gain — their freedom.”
Other groups such as Jews for Racial and Economic Justice tread a middle ground, saying, “We recognize that attacks on civilians by Hamas are neither justifiable nor unprovoked.”
Several days later, as the scale of the atrocities became clear, some of those activists walked back or qualified their statements. On Tuesday, New York City’s DSA said it mourned “the loss of life in the region” and apologized “for the confusion our post caused and for not making our values explicit.” It deleted its original tweet.
Brown also deleted her tweet and apologized on Wednesday. “I responded too quickly and in a moment of heightened emotion,” she said. “Witnessing Palestinians defy decades of oppression hardened me to the suffering of Israeli civilians, including my friends and family, and I regret that. I’m sorry.”
On the same day, Jewish Voice for Peace released another statement saying that it “mourns deeply for the over 1200 Israelis killed, the families destroyed, including many of our own, and fears for the lives of Israelis taken hostage.”
The group added, “the massacres committed by Hamas against Israeli civilians are horrific war crimes. There is no justification in international law for the indiscriminate killing of civilians or the holding of civilian hostages.”
On Wednesday, JVP spokesperson Sonya Meyerson-Knox said the group felt it was caught in a precarious position — fearing that public expressions of grief for Israeli civilians would fuel a harsher military response against Gaza.
“We were feeling the incredible pressure of needing to say something that we hope addresses both our fear and our grief and our sorrow and our anger, and that doesn’t allow any of that to be used as fodder for the Israeli government and the United States government warmongering,” Meyerson-Knox said. “Many of us are feeling compelled to process our grief through a hard pivot to a prevention of a scale of death that is utterly inconceivable.”
The Israel Defense Forces has repeatedly said it abides by international law and takes measures to prevent civilian casualties, including by risking its own troops to reduce collateral damage. Human rights organizations and the United Nations have cast doubt on those claims and harshly criticized the conduct of Israel’s military, while other bodies — in addition to the United States and other allies — have defended Israeli actions.
Angel said other activists on the Jewish left shared concerns similar to the ones expressed by Meyerson-Knox.
“Even people who are not expressing grief right now are grieving, and it’s a question of whether they think that that grief is the most important thing, and what they think that public expression of grief is going to do,” Angel said. “People are afraid that there’s going to be a Palestinian genocide.”
The high death toll among Israelis on Saturday had forced a reckoning for some on the Jewish left, since in previous conflicts more Palestinians were killed, Angel said, though she added that the balance of casualties was shifting as Israel carried out airstrikes in Gaza.
“We have never seen Israeli casualties, at least in one event, that exceeded Palestinian casualties,” she said, stressing that she still believed the conflict is rooted in Israel’s occupation despite the death toll. “We have become practiced at answering that and at trying to help people see that. We are not practiced at a situation like this.”
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The post The Jewish left is grappling, sometimes painfully, with how to respond to Hamas’ attack appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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US Senators Urge Secretary of Homeland Security to Secure Northern Border From Gaza Refugees
US Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) speaking at a press conference about the United States restricting weapons for Israel, at the US Capitol, Washington, DC. Photo: Michael Brochstein/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
Six US senators sent a letter to US Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas this week requesting that he increase security measures along the northern border in response to Canada accepting an influx of refugees from Gaza, the Palestinian enclave ruled by the terrorist group Hamas.
The six Republican lawmakers — Sens. Marco Rubio (FL), Ted Cruz (TX), Joni Ernst (IA), Tom Cotton (AK), Mike Braun (IN), and Josh Hawley (MO) — said they were “deeply concerned” that refugees from Gaza could sneak into the United States. The senators warned that allowing unvetted Palestinian refugees to cross the border poses a serious national security threat.
“On May 27, 2024, the Government of Canada announced its intent to increase the number of Gazans who will be allowed into their country under temporary special measures,” the senators wrote. “We are deeply concerned and request heightened scrutiny by the US Department of Homeland Security should any of them attempt to enter the United States at ports of entry as well as between ports of entry.”
After arriving in Canada, the Palestinian refugees will be given a “Refugee Travel Document,” which serves as a valid form of identification, the letter claimed, adding that US Citizenship and Immigration Services recognizes these documents as a valid substitute for a passport. The senators warned that “individuals with ties to terrorist groups” could potentially enter into the United States.
The letter argued that the US should maintain “common-sense terrorist screening and vetting” for any individual attempting to enter its borders from a foreign country. The lawmakers lamented that the Biden administration’s “”ax border enforcement” has rendered the country vulnerable to potential terrorist attacks. From April 1, 2023 to March 31, 2024, the US Customs and Border Protection’s Office of Field Operations intercepted over 233 suspected terrorists at the northern border, according to the letter.
“[T]he possibility of terrorists crossing the US-Canada border is deeply concerning given the deep penetration of Gazan society by Hamas,” the senators wrote. “It would be irresponsible for the US to not take necessary heightened precautions when foreigners attempt to enter the United States.”
On Oct. 7, Hamas launched the ongoing war in Gaza with its Oct. 7 invasion of and massacre of 1,200 people across southern Israel. The Palestinian terrorist group also kidnapped over 250 hostages.
In response, Israel launched defensive military operations in Gaza with the aim of freeing the hostages and permanently dislodging Hamas from the neighboring enclave.
The vast majority of Palestinians in Gaza, as well as the West Bank, still support Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel that started the ongoing war, and they would prefer a “day after” scenario in which Hamas remains in control of Gaza rather than the Palestinian Authority, which governs in the West Bank, or other Arab countries, according to recent Palestinian polling. The same polling found that, when asked about support for Palestinian political parties and movements, a plurality chose Hamas.
US lawmakers are split along party lines as to whether the United States should accept refugees from Gaza. Republicans are largely opposed to importing refugees from Gaza, arguing that individuals from the war-torn enclave present “a national security risk” to the United States.” In May, Ernst and Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) sent US President Joe Biden a letter, urging him not to accept any refugees from Gaza.
In June, however, a group of 70 Democratic lawmakers sent Mayorkas a letter, requesting he create “pathways” for more refugees of the Israel-Hamas war to resettle in America.
The post US Senators Urge Secretary of Homeland Security to Secure Northern Border From Gaza Refugees first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Video of Masked Man Vowing ‘Rivers of Blood’ at Paris Olympics Over Israel Support Appears to Be Fake, of Russia Origin
Screenshot of a widely circulated video published on social media showing a masked man vowing that “rivers of blood will flow” at the 2024 Paris Olympics due to France’s support for Israel. According to reports, the video appears to be fake and of Russian origin.
A widely circulated video published on social media this week showing a masked man vowing that “rivers of blood will flow” at the 2024 Paris Olympics due to France’s support for Israel appears to be fake and of Russian origin, according to reports.
The video — published on Tuesday on social media networks including X/Twitter and Telegram — featured a keffiyeh-clad man with his face covered, delivering an Arabic-language address threatening France with violence due to the country’s alleged support for Israel amid its ongoing war with Hamas in Gaza.
Addressing “the people of France” and “French President [Emmanuel] Macron,” the masked individual said, “You supported the Zionist regime in its criminal war against the people of Palestine. You provided Zionists with weapons; you helped murder our brothers and sisters, our children.”
“You invited the Zionists to the Olympic games. You will pay for what you have done!” continued the man, who wore a shirt adorned with a Palestinian flag. “Rivers of blood will flow through the streets of Paris. This day is approaching, God willing. Allah is the greatest.”
The video, published on X/Twitter by the account @endzionism24 and retweeted by Palestinian activist Ihab Hassan, ended with the speaker holding a prop severed head complete with fake blood up for the camera.
He is not a Palestinian:
A video clip has surfaced showing an individual wearing a keffiyeh and a Palestinian flag badge, threatening France with a “river of blood” at the Olympic Games.
It is glaringly obvious to any Arabic speaker that this person is not Arab; his dialect… pic.twitter.com/rwWGkkbiAi
— Ihab Hassan (@IhabHassane) July 23, 2024
Hassan and other social media users immediately noted that the man speaking was clearly not a native Arabic speaker, citing his reasonably fluent but awkward and occasionally incorrect pronunciation.
Many social media users aware of the mispronunciations seemed to blame Israel for the video, implying the clip was a false flag meant to fearmonger and demonize Palestinians and Muslims. They did not address the fact that Israel has access to hundreds of thousands of native Palestinian Arabic speakers who would sound far more convincing than the man in the video.
On Wednesday, French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said that “French secret services and their partners have not been able to authenticate the veracity of this video.”
According to researchers at Microsoft, however, the video appears to be part of a Russian-linked disinformation campaign meant to disrupt the Olympics, which began with the opening ceremony on Friday.
The researchers from Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center told NBC News that the clip appears to have come from a Russian disinformation group known as Storm-1516, an outgrowth of Russia’s Internet Research Agency.
The latest clip was linked to a similar disinformation video falsely alleging that Ukraine had sent arms to Hamas — a claim for which there is no evidence. According to the researchers, the more recent video appears to be part of a Russian scare campaign meant to disrupt the Olympics.
The video came just days before France’s rail infrastructure was hit on Friday, ahead of the start of the Olympics, with widespread acts of vandalism including arson attacks, paralyzing travel to Paris from the rest of France and Europe just hours before the opening ceremony of the Olympics. French authorities described the acts as “criminal” and “malicious.”
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said that the sabotage of France’s high-speed rail network was directed by Iran, which Western intelligence agencies have for years labeled as the world’s foremost state sponsor of terrorism.
“The sabotage of railway infrastructure across France ahead of the Olympics was planned and executed under the influence of Iran’s axis of evil and radical Islam,” Katz wrote on X/Twitter. “As I warned my French counterpart [Stéphane Séjourné] this week, based on information held by Israel, Iranians are planning terrorist attacks against the Israeli delegation and all Olympic participants. Increased preventive measures must be taken to thwart their plot. The free world must stop Iran now — before it’s too late.”
Katz was referring to a letter he sent on Thursday to Séjourné raising alarm bells about what he described as a plan by Iran to attack Israel’s Olympic delegation.
Darmanin and French National Police both announced previously that they are taking increased security measures to ensure the safety of Israel’s Olympic delegation while they are in Paris amid mounting threats. These measures include providing them with round the clock security from French police. The Israeli delegation will also receive additional security details from Israel’s Shin Bet security agency during the Olympics.
The post Video of Masked Man Vowing ‘Rivers of Blood’ at Paris Olympics Over Israel Support Appears to Be Fake, of Russia Origin first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Top St. Louis Newspaper Endorses US Rep. Cori Bush’s Opponent, Argues Incumbent’s Israel Stance Is ‘Disqualifying’
US Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) raises her fist as US Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) addresses a pro-Hamas demonstration in Washington, DC. Photo: Reuters/Allison Bailey
The editorial board of The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the largest daily newspaper in Missouri, has endorsed the opponent of US Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO), pointing to the incumbent congresswoman’s lack of legislative accomplishments and stance on the Israel-Hamas war.
The Post-Dispatch argued that Bush’s position on Israel and the Gaza war should be “disqualifying” for any elected representative. The outlet took umbrage with Bush for equating a close democratic ally of the US with a genocidal terrorist organization.
“Israel’s conduct of the war has been far from perfect, but it remains a democracy fighting for survival against an evil terrorist organization. Bush’s tendency to equate both sides — and even to side with the terrorists, as when she cast one of just two House votes against a resolution to bar Hamas members from the US — should in itself be disqualifying for re-election,” the editorial board wrote.
Bush has established herself as one of the most vocal critics of Israel in the US Congress. Only nine days after Hamas’ Oct. 7 slaughter of roughly 1,200 people in southern Israel, Bush called for an “immediate ceasefire” between Israel and the Palestinian terrorist group. As the war dragged on, Bush’s rhetoric toward Israel sharpened, with the congresswoman accusing the Jewish state of committing “genocide” in Gaza and “apartheid” in the West Bank. Bush has also accused Israel of inflicting a “famine” in Gaza without providing evidence.
Bush seems more interested in pandering to the far-left fringes of the progressive movement than serving her constituents, the Post-Dispatch argued. Bush’s membership in “The Squad” — a clique of far-left progressive, anti-establishment lawmakers in the House of Representatives — has rendered her completely incapable of “accomplishing anything” in the halls of Congress, according to the newspaper.
The editorial board urged its readers to vote for Wesley Bell, pointing to his moderated approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as an example of his pragmatism and moral clarity.
“On Israel, Bell offers an appropriately measured stance, acknowledging the need to protect Gazan civilians and work toward a two-state solution, while supporting America’s closest ally in the Middle East,” the outlet wrote.
In contrast to Bush, Bell has expressed more sympathy to Israel’s military operations in Gaza, emphatically rejecting the notion that Israel’s actions in Gaza constitute “genocide” or “ethnic cleansing.”
Moreover, Bell has strengthened his ties with the Jewish community over the course of his campaign. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the foremost pro-Israel lobbying group in the US, donated a reported $5 million to Bell’s campaign through its United Democracy Project super PAC. A group of 30 St. Louis-area rabbis penned a letter endorsing Bell, accusing Bush of a “lack of decency, disregard for history, and for intentionally fueling antisemitism and hatred.” Bell also brought about an official “director of Jewish outreach” to increase turnout among the Jewish community.
A poll commissioned by McLaughlin & Associates and sponsored by the CCA Action Fund, a pro-Bell super PAC, showed Bell with a commanding 56 percent to 33 percent lead over Bush.
Supporters of Israel see the primary race as a prime opportunity to oust another opponent of the Jewish state from the halls of Congress. Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), a progressive lawmaker, lost his primary race to a pro-Israel challenger on June 25. Over the course of his reelection campaign, Bowman accused Israel of committing “genocide” and enacting “apartheid” against Palestinians. Bowman’s comments incensed Jewish constituents in the leafy suburbs of Westchester County, New York.
Furthermore, observers are looking to the race as a potential indicator of the Democratic electorate’s position on Israel. Opinions of the Jewish state among Democrats have soured in the months following Oct. 7, calling into question whether anti-Israel views are still a liability with American liberals.
The post Top St. Louis Newspaper Endorses US Rep. Cori Bush’s Opponent, Argues Incumbent’s Israel Stance Is ‘Disqualifying’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.