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There Is No Resuscitating the Oslo Delusion
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken looks on, as U.S. President Joe Biden (not pictured) speaks about the conflict in Israel, after Hamas launched its biggest attack in decades, while making a statement about the crisis, at the White House in Washington, U.S. October 7, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz/File Photo
JNS.org – U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken again visited a handful of Middle Eastern countries this week, including Israel, in an attempt to help calm regional unrest and work for the release of about 105 hostages still being held captive since the Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel on Oct. 7. While in Jerusalem, in hand was an offer to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu from Hamas for a ceasefire.
According to an Axios report, what Hamas offered would have come in three stages: In the first 45 days, in return for 1,500 Palestinian prisoners being held in Israeli jails, including those who have been convicted of murder, the Israel Defense Forces would have to leave Gaza, completely. In exchange, the Palestinians would release Israeli women, the elderly and all those under 18. The second phase would release Israeli males of fighting age. The final phase would involve giving Israel the remains of the dead. (It is a sobering reality, but 31 of the remaining hostages were declared deceased earlier this week by Israeli authorities.)
The Oslo Accords were also a phased plan whereby trust was supposed to have been developed with each new stage. Initially, the negotiations were drafted behind closed doors by Yossi Beilin, who held a number of governmental positions in the Labor Party; Ahmed Qurei, a Palestinian politician and negotiator; and Terge Larsen, a Norwegian sociologist. On Sept. 13, 1993, PLO chief Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin (with U.S. President Bill Clinton acting as facilitator) signed the Declaration of Principles and shook hands on the White House lawn. Likewise, Palestinian statehood was to have been earned, not automatically bequeathed on a silver platter.
There had been a slight pause in hostilities, and by May 10, 1994, Arafat spoke at a mosque in Johannesburg calling for a “jihad to liberate all of Jerusalem.” “Peace-loving” spin doctors from the left dubbed Arafat’s declaration of death an “internal struggle.”
So much for “pauses” to guarantee trust. We know that a 135-day pause only amounts to a victory for Hamas, which will only use this time to regroup and try to retake control of the areas in the Gaza Strip.
Let’s remember the sadistic reality that was Oct. 7—the mass murder of approximately 1,200 Israelis, plus rape, torture, mutilation of bodies, the butchering and burning of babies in front of their parents, and approximately 240 men, women and children who were dragged off to Gaza, kept in cages and tunnels to this day.
For some peculiar reason, there seems to be no agency for the attacking party: Hamas operatives, joined by Palestinian residents from Gaza, who engaged in the most sadistic sort of actions against the Jewish people since the Holocaust.
Everyone, of course, is praying for the release of all of the hostages. Looking at their omnipresent photos and those of their families is like wrenching out one chamber of our collective hearts, as Jews.
However, before the United States cajoles Israel into anything, it is important to ask: Did anyone cajole the United States into a ceasefire with the Nazis? And can anyone deny that the horrific events of Oct. 7 were Nazi-like?
There is a quite familiar dance that those of us who have been observers of the Middle East for decades have been watching: Israel tries to reach out to its neighbors in peace; its overtures are rejected; Israel is violently attacked; Israel (and Israel alone) is asked to bow its knees and make “painful compromises” for peace.
According to a Jan. 31 report by Barak Ravid, the U.S. State Department has been reviewing policy options for a Palestinian state. The options include bilaterally accepting a Palestinian state; not using its veto power in the United Nations to block admitting Palestine as a full voting member state; and encouraging other nations to recognize Palestine.
Why is this dastardly behavior on the part of Hamas being rewarded by the two-state delusion, once again?
Think back to attempt solutions to the Israeli-Arab conflict: 2002 and the Road Map for Peace; to 1993 and the signing of the Oslo Accords; to 1967 and the Khartoum Conference; to 1947 and the U.N. Partition Plan; to 1937 and the Peel Commission. The Washington foreign-policy establishment always returns to the same old failed paradigm. All of this seems to represent a supreme failure of the imagination.
According to the highly-respected Palestinian Center for Survey and Research, in a recent poll, fully 82% of the Palestinian residents of Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), are in support of the atrocities of Oct. 7.
How could Israel be expected to live in long-term peace and security with such neighbors? What guarantee is there that the reward of a Palestinian state to Israel’s enemies would result in a peace that would endure for generations, let alone years?
And speaking of that recent poll of Palestinians, support for 88-year-old Palestinian Authority Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Authority has dropped significantly. When asked who would rule Gaza after the war, only 7% said the P.A. with Abbas in control.
Yet the State Department is talking about a “revived P.A.” Why? Because their covenant, which has never been revoked, talks about a “phased plan” to attack Israel from any area that is evacuated. As opposed to Hamas, which would do it all on the very first day.
It is the P.A., not Hamas, that has established the curriculum of vile antisemitism and the goal of replacing all of Israel with Palestine. It is the P.A. that uses UNRWA schools in the Middle East to incite Arab youth against Jews, with hatred spewed in textbooks. These are the teachings that helped launch the events of Oct. 7.
I recently returned from Israel, and beneath the moral resolve to survive is an almost palpable existential despair. Israelis are willing to fight and die for the right of their people to live within defensible borders. Most no longer believe that two states are the answer—and that Palestinians will suddenly and magically be willing to live in peace and security side by side with Israel.
The post There Is No Resuscitating the Oslo Delusion first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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US Clamps Sanctions on Israel-bashing UN Rights Monitor Albanese
Francesca Albanese, UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, attends a side event during the Human Rights Council at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, March 26, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Denis Balibouse
The Trump administration has imposed sweeping sanctions against Francesca Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, citing the UN official’s lengthy record of singling out Israel for condemnation.
In a post on X, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the sanctions under a February executive order targeting those who “prompt International Criminal Court (ICC) action against U.S. and Israeli officials, companies, and executives.” He accused Albanese of waging “political and economic warfare” against both nations and asserted that “such efforts will no longer be tolerated.”
“Today I am imposing sanctions on UN Human Rights Council Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese for her illegitimate and shameful efforts to prompt [International Criminal Court] action against U.S. and Israeli officials, companies, and executives,” Rubio announced on X/Twitter.
“Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated,” declared the Trump administration’s top foreign affairs official. “We will always stand by our partners in their right to self-defense.”
Rubio concluded: “The United States will continue to take whatever actions we deem necessary to respond to lawfare and protect our sovereignty and that of our allies.”
The decision to impose sanctions on Albanese marks an escalation in the ongoing feud between the White House and the United Nations over Israel. The Trump administration has repeatedly accused the UN and Albanese of unfairly targeting Israel and mischaracterizing the Jewish state’s conduct in Gaza.
Albanese, an Italian lawyer and academic, has held the position of UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories since 2022. The position authorizes her to monitor and report on alleged “human rights violations” by Israel against Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
Last week, Albanese issued a scathing report accusing companies of helping Israel maintain a so-called “genocide economy.” She called on the companies to cut off economic ties with Israel and warned that they might be guilty of “complicity” in the so-called “genocide” in Gaza.
Critics of Albanese have long accused her of exhibiting an excessive anti-Israel bias, calling into question her fairness and neutrality.
Albanese has an extensive history of using her role at the UN to denigrate Israel and seemingly rationalize Hamas’ attacks on the Jewish state.
In the months following the Palestinian terrorist group’s atrocities across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Albanese accused the Jewish state of perpetrating a “genocide” against the Palestinian people in revenge for the attacks and circulated a widely derided and heavily disputed report alleging that 186,000 people had been killed in the Gaza war as a result of Israeli actions.
The action comes as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits Washington, where he has received a warm reception from the Trump administration. Netanyahu has been meeting with US officials to discuss next steps in the ongoing Gaza military operation.
Gideon Sa’ar, Minister of Foreign Affairs for Israel, commended the Rubio announcement with his own post on X/Twitter, exclaiming: “A clear message. Time for the UN to pay attention!”
The post US Clamps Sanctions on Israel-bashing UN Rights Monitor Albanese first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Hardball: Trump Administration Reports Harvard to Accreditor Over Antisemitism Allegations
US President Donald Trump speaks during a Cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, DC, July 8, 2025. Photo: Kevin Lamarque via Reuters Connect.
The Trump administration escalated its showdown against Harvard University on Wednesday, reporting the institution to its accreditor for alleged civil rights violations resulting from its weak response to reports of antisemitic bullying, discrimination, and harassment following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 massacre across southern Israel.
The US Department of Education (DOE) announced the action on Wednesday. Citing Harvard’s admitted failure to treat antisemitism as seriously as it treated others forms of hatred in the past, the DOE called on the New England Commission of Higher Education to review and, potentially, revoke its accreditation — a designation which qualifies Harvard for federal funding and attests to the quality of the educational services its provides.
“Accrediting bodies play a significant role in preserving academic integrity and a campus culture conducive to truth seeking and learning,” said Secretary of Education Linda McMahon. “Part of that is ensuring students are safe on campus and abiding by federal laws that guarantee educational opportunities to all students. By allowing anti-Semitic harassment and discrimination to persist unchecked on its campus, Harvard University has failed in its obligation to students, educators, and American taxpayers.”
The DOE, McMahon added, “expects the New England Commission of Higher Education to enforce its policies and practices, and to keep the Department fully informed of its efforts to ensure that Harvard is in compliance with federal law and accreditor standards.”
As previously reported by The Algemeiner, Harvard’s Presidential Task Force on Combating Antisemitism has acknowledged that the university administration’s handling of campus antisemitism fell well below its obligations under both Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and its own nondiscrimination policies.
In a 300-plus-page report, the task force compiled a comprehensive record of antisemitic incidents on Harvard’s campus in recent years — from the Harvard Palestine Solidarity Committee’s endorsement of the Oct. 7 terrorist atrocities to an anti-Zionist faculty group’s sharing an antisemitic cartoon depicting Jews as murderers of people of color. The report identified Harvard’s past refusal to afford Jews the same protections against discrimination enjoyed by other minority groups as a key source of its problem.
Coming several weeks after President Donald Trump ordered the freeze of $2.26 billion in federal research grants and contracts for Harvard, the task force report found it was “clear” that antisemitism and anti-Israel bias have been fomented, practiced, and tolerated not only at Harvard but also within academia more widely.”
The university is now suing the federal government over the funding halt.
President Trump has spoken scathingly of Harvard, calling it, for example, an “Anti-Semitic, Far Left Institute … with students being accepted from all over the world that want to rip our Country apart” in an April post to his Truth Social platform.
In recent weeks, however, both Trump and McMahon had commended Harvard’s constructive response in negotiations over reforms the administration has asked it to implement as a precondition for restoring federal funds. The requested reforms include hiring more conservative faculty, shuttering diversity, equity, and inclusion [DEI] programs, and slashing the size of administrative offices tangential to the university’s central educational mission.
The administration has since changed its tone in the wake of a report by The Harvard Crimson that interim Harvard President Alan Garber has said “behind closed doors” that he has no intention of doing anything that would make Harvard more palatable to conservatives.
Earlier this month, the Trump administration’s Joint Task Force to Combat Antisemitism issued Harvard a formal “notice of violation” of civil rights law. Charging that Harvard willfully exposed Jewish students to a flood of racist and antisemitic abuse both in and outside of the classroom, it threatened to strip whatever remains of Harvard’s federal funding.
“Failure to institute adequate changes immediately will result in the loss of all federal financial resources and continue to affect Harvard’s relationship with the federal government,” wrote the federal officials comprising the multiagency Task Force. “Harvard may of course continue to operate free of federal privileges, and perhaps such an opportunity will spur a commitment to excellence that will help Harvard thrive once again.”
In Wednesday’s announcement, US Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Harvard’s conduct “forfeits the legitimacy that accreditation is designed to uphold.”
“HHS and Department of Education will actively hold Harvard accountable through sustained oversight until it restores public trust and ensures a campus free of discrimination,” he said.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Hardball: Trump Administration Reports Harvard to Accreditor Over Antisemitism Allegations first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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IDF Strikes Hezbollah Sites in South Lebanon as Terror Group Pushes to Rebuild Amid US Disarmament Talks
IDF operating in southern Lebanon. Photo: IDF Spokesperson
Israeli forces uncovered and destroyed Hezbollah weapons caches in southern Lebanon on Wednesday, as a new report indicated that despite ongoing U.S.-led efforts to secure a disarmament deal, the Iran-backed group is making repeated, largely concealed attempts to rebuild its military presence in the area.
Troops carried out several operations targeting Hezbollah infrastructure in southern Lebanon on Wednesday morning, destroying weapons depots, explosives and multibarrel launchers concealed in forested terrain, the IDF said, in violation of the November ceasefire, which requires Hezbollah to withdraw its forces 20 miles from the Israeli border.
A new report released this week by the Alma Research and Education Center found that Hezbollah is focused on rebuilding in three areas: operational deployment, weapons acquisition, and financial recovery.
“Hezbollah didn’t give up its resistance narrative and motivation,” Alma’s director, Lt. Col. (Res.) Sarit Zehavi, told The Algemeiner.
“It wants to rebuild its capabilities and infrastructures, whether it’s the villages that will be used as human shields or the military infrastructure in South Lebanon and in Lebanon in general.”
According to Zehavi, Hezbollah is attempting to return Radwan fighters to positions south of the Litani River as part of a wider plan to restore its elite forces to operational readiness. The IDF on Monday killed Radwan commander Ali Abd al-Hassan Haidar in a targeted strike. The action came hours after US Special Envoy for Syria Thomas Barrack met with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri in Beirut to discuss a long-term deal that would include an Israeli withdrawal and complete disarmament of Hezbollah.
Barrack described the Lebanese response to the proposal as positive. Later, he issued a blunt warning to Hezbollah in response to a vow by the terror group’s leader, Naim Qassem, not to lay down its arms. “If they mess with us anywhere in the world, they will have a serious problem with us,” Barrack said in an interview with Lebanese news network LBCI. “They don’t want that.”
Zehavi said it was premature to predict the outcome of the diplomatic efforts. She warned that the challenge of disarming Hezbollah remains enormous and emphasized that the Lebanese Armed Forces have not demonstrated the capability or willingness to confront the group.
“It’s too soon to be optimistic or pessimistic,” she said, noting that no firm commitments have emerged from the Beirut talks.
Hezbollah’s efforts to smuggle and manufacture weapons have been complicated by both Israeli strikes and the regional realignment over recent months. While Israeli strikes have disrupted many supply routes, according to Zehavi, Syrian authorities have intercepted far more Hezbollah-bound weapons than the Lebanese Army, which claims to have uncovered 500 arms caches but has provided no evidence.
The financial front marks the third aspect of Hezbollah’s rebuilding effort. Last week, the group halted cash payments to Shiite civilians whose homes were damaged in the war, citing liquidity problems. Zehavi attributed the shortfall to disruptions in Iran’s funding networks — an outcome of the 12-day war against the regime in Tehran — and said the constraints would likely hamper Hezbollah’s ability to compensate its base and sustain operations.
“I hope they will continue to have problems with the cash flow, that way it will be very difficult for them to recover,” she said.
The post IDF Strikes Hezbollah Sites in South Lebanon as Terror Group Pushes to Rebuild Amid US Disarmament Talks first appeared on Algemeiner.com.