|
In-Depth Issues:
U.S. Approves 2026 Defense Budget with $4 Billion for Israel - Daniel Adelson ( Ynet News)
Congress approved the 2026 defense budget, which includes an extensive security assistance package for Israel.
Among the approved items: $3 billion in direct security aid, $500 million for joint air defense, and increased budgets for cooperation in drones, lasers and anti-tunnel systems.
The law also bans funding for UNRWA due to involvement of its personnel in the Oct. 7 massacre, and denial of funding to "international bodies that act against Israel," such as the International Criminal Court in The Hague and the UN Human Rights Council.
IDF Assessment: Hizbullah Likely to Join U.S.-Iran Conflict - Idan Avni ( Israel Hayom)
The prevailing assessment in the IDF Northern Command is that if a U.S.-led campaign against Iran breaks out, Hizbullah will join in, due to its role as part of the Iranian axis.
Hizbullah is fully aware that joining the fighting would exact an especially heavy price.
See also Israeli Raids Leave Hizbullah Weakened - Shachar Kleiman ( Israel Hayom)
Hizbullah is weakened, exhausted, and in the midst of a complex rehabilitation process.
Israel is acting consistently against this rehabilitation process, with targeted killings, enforcement operations, and raids.
Hizbullah is also facing a financial crisis, struggling to pay salaries, with clear signs of eroding motivation.
There have been cases in which operatives failed to respond to call-up orders due to nonpayment. Recruitment efforts are faltering, and its human infrastructure is wearing down.
Houthis to Strike Israel, U.S. Ships, If U.S. Attacks Iran - Tzvi Jasper ( Jerusalem Post)
Israeli security forces are operating under the assumption that Yemen's Houthi terrorists will resume attacks on Israel and U.S. ships if the U.S. strikes Iran, Israel's Channel 11 reported on Wednesday.
A source within a Yemenite faction combating the Houthis said they had begun moving military resources, including missiles and drones, in preparation for future strikes.
Palestinian Islamic Jihad: We Will Never Surrender Our Weapons ( MEMRI TV)
Palestinian Islamic Jihad spokesman Muhammad Al-Hajj Musa told Palestine Today TV on Jan. 29, 2026, that PIJ will never surrender its weapons.
"Until this very moment, we have not negotiated with the mediators about the weapons. Our firm stance is that these weapons belong to the Palestinians....Why should we relinquish our weapons?"
"The weapons will stay in the hands of the resistance. They will not be stored or put away anywhere....We will never surrender them."
Video: IDF Drone Footage Shows Hamas Gunmen Transporting Arms in Gaza Ambulance - Emanuel Fabian ( Times of Israel)
Armed Hamas operatives are seen using ambulances to transport weapons in northern Gaza, in drone footage published by the IDF on Wednesday.
"Routine drone operations exposed how armed Hamas terrorists repeatedly and systematically use ambulances to transfer operatives and weapons from a hospital to a school."
Follow the Jerusalem Center on:
U.S. Sanctions Upend the Lives of International Criminal Court Judges - Marlise Simons ( New York Times)
Since the Trump administration imposed sanctions on ICC judge Luz del Carmen Ibanez Carranza of Peru and on some of her colleagues in retaliation for the court's decision to investigate U.S. personnel in Afghanistan, the penalties effectively cut the judges off from all American funds, goods and credit cards, and prohibit individuals and business in the U.S. from working with them.
"We're treated like pariahs, we are on a list with terrorists and drug dealers," she said.
On Dec. 18, Washington blacklisted two more ICC judges, making 11 of the court's top officials - eight judges and the three top prosecutors - subject to American sanctions.
Kimberly Prost, a Canadian judge who has been targeted, described the "pervasive, negative impact on daily life" of the restrictions she faces.
"You lose immediate access to all the main credit cards that go through the Swift system, which is controlled by the U.S."
"My Amazon and Google accounts were closed. You cannot pay for your utilities, your subscriptions. You're completely crippled when it comes to booking hotels, trains, flights. You can't buy dollars because your name is flagged."
Iran Is Deeply Entrenched in Europe - Danielle Greyman-Kennard ( Jerusalem Post)
After the European Parliament voted to designate the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization in response to the mass killing of protesters, dismantling Tehran's deeply embedded networks across Europe will be a formidable task, security experts warned.
Roger Macmillan, a former director at Iran International, said the IRGC is "incredibly well embedded, [in] charities, business proxies, criminal gangs, cultural centers. They have them all over, education centers, cultural education, religious foundations."
The Idea of Zion and the American Story - Dr. Steven Windmueller ( Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs)
Zion has functioned in American culture as both a spiritual symbol and a framework for national identity, shaping how Americans understand purpose, chosenness, and destiny.
From early colonial theology through presidential rhetoric, Jewish experience, and Christian religious movements, the idea evolved from metaphor to concrete political and religious engagement with Israel.
Jewish Americans often viewed the U.S. itself as a form of Zion, while Christian movements increasingly tied biblical interpretation to support for a Jewish homeland.
Over time, these religious and cultural ideas merged with strategic, political, and democratic partnerships between the U.S. and Israel.
The writer, Emeritus Professor of Jewish Communal Studies at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, Los Angeles, is a fellow of the Jerusalem Center.
Search the Recent History of Israel and the Middle East
Send the Daily Alert to a Friend If you are viewing the email version of the Daily Alert and want to share it with friends, please click Forward in your email program and enter their address.
|
|
News Resources - North America, Europe, and Asia:
- After Crushing Protests, Iran's Supreme Leader Tries to Avert a U.S. Attack - Lee Keath
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, 86, is trying to avert a potential U.S. attack. He is allowing Iran to enter negotiations with the U.S. over its nuclear program, reversing his previous rejection of talks. Still, Iran's domestic crackdown displayed the iron grip that Khamenei and his Revolutionary Guards are capable of imposing. Thousands were killed and tens of thousands were arrested.
By agreeing to nuclear negotiations with the U.S., Khamenei may be seeking to buy time to avert U.S. strikes. But the two sides are far apart. Iran has staunchly opposed the main American demands, that it halt all nuclear enrichment and that it surrender its uranium stocks. (AP)
- U.S. and Iran to Hold Talks in Oman on Friday - Farnaz Fassihi
Iran and the U.S. will meet for a new round of negotiations on Friday in Oman, Iran's foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, and the White House said on Wednesday. President Trump has vowed to carry out military strikes against the country if it did not accept U.S. demands to freeze its nuclear program and discard its stockpile of enriched uranium; reduce the range of its ballistic missiles; and stop arming and funding militant groups in the region. Iran has said that caving in to Trump's demands would amount to surrendering. (New York Times)
- U.S. Shoots Down Iranian Drone Approaching Aircraft Carrier - Konstantin Toropin
A U.S. Navy F-35 fighter jet shot down an Iranian drone that was approaching the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln in the Arabian Sea, U.S. Central Command said Tuesday. The drone "continued to fly toward the ship despite de-escalatory measures taken by U.S. forces operating in international waters," said Central Command spokesman Capt. Tim Hawkins.
(AP)
- Iranian Gunboats Approach U.S.-Flagged Tanker in Strait of Hormuz
Iranian gunboats approached a U.S.-flagged tanker in the Strait of Hormuz north of Oman, maritime sources said Tuesday. The Iranian boats ordered the tanker, the Stena Imperative, to stop its engine and prepare to be boarded. The vessel did not enter Iranian internal territorial waters and was escorted by the U.S. destroyer USS McFaul, with defensive air support from the U.S. Air Force.
(Reuters)
News Resources - Israel and the Mideast:
- Israel, U.S. Meet Ahead of Nuclear Talks with Iran - Itamar Eichner
U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff met Tuesday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel's top security officials, ahead of talks between Washington and Tehran scheduled to open Friday. Israeli officials presented the latest intelligence on Iran's nuclear program and its ballistic missile project, as well as information on the massacre of Iranian civilians.
Netanyahu presented Israel's red lines for any acceptable agreement with Iran: zero uranium enrichment, the removal from Iranian territory of Iran's stockpile of enriched uranium, a halt to the ballistic missile program, and an end to Iranian support for its regional proxies. Officials say Iran has sent messages to mediators that any talks be limited exclusively to the nuclear issue.
(Ynet News)
See also Netanyahu Meets U.S. Envoy Witkoff in Jerusalem
During talks between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff on Tuesday, the prime minister reiterated that the disarmament of Hamas and the demilitarization of Gaza must happen before reconstruction. He clarified that the Palestinian Authority will not be part of the administration of Gaza in any way.
Netanyahu also clarified that Iran has proven time and again that its promises cannot be relied upon.
(Prime Minister's Office)
- IDF Officer Seriously Wounded by Palestinian Fire in Gaza - Yoav Zitun
An IDF reserve officer was seriously wounded Wednesday after coming under terrorist fire in the Israeli-held Daraj Tuffah neighborhood in eastern Gaza City. The IDF said, "Immediately after the shooting, tanks opened fire at the terrorists and airstrikes were launched in parallel. This was a blatant violation of the ceasefire agreement." (Ynet News)
See also IDF Eliminates Islamic Jihad Commander in Response to Gaza Attack - Yoav Zitun
The IDF eliminated Ali al-Razaina, commander of Islamic Jihad's northern Gaza brigade, in response to terrorist gunfire that severely wounded an IDF officer.
(Ynet News)
Global Commentary and Think-Tank Analysis:
Iran
- Why No One Wants Iran to Win or Collapse - Aviram Bellaishe
What are President Trump's options in Iran? A symbolic strike would be worse than no strike at all. It would give Iran a narrative of "standing up to America" without degrading its capabilities. Regime change? That would require military or Revolutionary Guards elements willing to defect and lead under American sponsorship. That does not exist. One option remains: a deal that looks like victory. The problem is that Iran needs exactly the same thing.
Iran needs sanctions relief to survive. But it cannot afford to appear defeated. In the Middle East, a regime that appears to have "surrendered" loses legitimacy, not only in the eyes of its people but in the eyes of its proxies and the enemies circling it. The paradox is that the weaker the regime becomes, the stronger it needs to appear. This narrows its flexibility precisely when flexibility is most needed.
In recent days, Iran demanded moving the talks from Istanbul to Oman and shifting from a multilateral format to bilateral talks with the U.S. alone. A regional summit with seven foreign ministers watching feels too much like a surrender ceremony.
From the perspective of the mediators - Turkey, Qatar, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia - the ideal situation is precisely what exists now: a weakened Iran, an exhausted Shiite axis, but no total collapse that would bring chaos and refugees. They do not want a regional war. But neither do they want an Iran freed from sanctions, with oil flowing and Iranians building a competing economic empire.
Everyone, including Trump, seeks a diplomatic solution because they fear the alternative.
What happens if the Iranian regime falls? There is no organized opposition inside Iran. Reza Pahlavi is a nostalgic symbol, not a leader with an apparatus. There is no coordination with military or Revolutionary Guards elements prepared to lead an orderly transition.
The writer, vice president of the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs, has served in senior government positions for over 25 years. (Israel Hayom)
- Pressure Alone Will Not Break Iran - Maj. (res.) Danny Citrinowicz
Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is inherently suspicious of the U.S. in general and of the American president in particular. He sees a comprehensive conspiracy against the regime, most recently the 12-day war and the wave of protests across Iran. Seen through this lens, it is clear why he has no intention of compromising on the regime's core principles. He prefers to risk an attack rather than submit.
The American administration operates under the assumption that a combination of military pressure and a show of force will ultimately compel Tehran to accept U.S. demands, not only on the nuclear issue, but also on its missile program and network of regional proxies.
Anyone attempting to anticipate Iran's next moves must understand that from the regime's perspective, its positions cannot be separated from the belief that it "stood firm" both in the military confrontation and in the face of protests, which it sees as part of a broad Western plot to overthrow it.
As long as Khamenei remains at Iran's helm, regardless of what the U.S. does, it can be expected that he will not cross the line he has already defined as surrender. For the supreme leader, loyalty to the revolution's ideology outweighs considerations of prosperity or stability. Abandoning these principles would, in his eyes, amount to abandoning the revolution itself. Thus, in practice, the diplomatic track currently appears devoid of real viability.
The writer, former head of the Iran branch in the research and analysis division of Israel defense intelligence, is a senior research fellow at the Institute of Policy and Strategy at Reichman University.
(Israel Hayom)
- Where Do U.S.-Iran Negotiations Leave Israel? - Ariel E. Levite
President Trump's clear preference is not to attack Iran but to leverage the threat of an onslaught to advance a deal. The regime in Tehran, which has been weakened and is despised by much of its own people, desperately seeks an agreement with the U.S. or at least drawn-out talks that will forestall an imminent attack.
The U.S. is believed to be making three demands of the Iranians - ending their pursuit of nuclear weapons, limiting their ballistic missile program, and getting them to stop aiding subversive elements in the Middle East. Regime change is not on the list.
Israel doesn't have the power to prevent an agreement between the U.S. and Iran or burden a deal with excessive demands. Moreover, an Israeli attack on the regime or its missile arsenal while negotiations are underway or after a deal is struck will be impossible.
Still, diplomatic engagement presents problems. The most pressing is the tension between the Iranians' playing for time in any talks and the Americans' inability to sustain a large military deployment in the region indefinitely. The second is the de facto betrayal of the Iranian people, who have suffered under the ayatollahs' cruel and corrupt rule. Renewed dialogue with the U.S. would accord Iran's leaders a better chance of survival without moderating their hostility toward Israel.
The leaders in Tehran can bet that once the Americans lift the threat of an attack and withdraw their forces from the region, it won't be easy to redeploy them.
The writer, former deputy director general for policy at the Israel Atomic Energy Commission and head of the Bureau of International Security and Arms Control in the Israel Ministry of Defense, is a Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. (Ha'aretz)
- President Trump's Supposed Allies Are on Iran's Side - Col. (ret.) Yigal Carmon
According to America's supposed allies, Turkish President Erdogan and the Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, America should surrender to Iran's terms to avoid regional war. The Iranian regime brags that it won the 12-day war in June 2025. As a result, America must surrender and accept Iran's terms. This is what President Trump's fake allies are pressuring him to do.
It is always good to avoid war if you can win true peace in exchange. In this case, the peace that America will win is a return to the belligerent, anti-American position of Iran, now emboldened and more aggressive.
The writer, former counter-terrorism advisor to two Israeli prime ministers, is founder and president of the Middle East Media Research Institute. (MEMRI)
- Israelis Stand with the Brave Iranian People - Tamar Schwarzbard
In September 2022, when millions of brave Iranians took to the streets under the banner of "Woman, Life, Freedom,"
I was head of digital operations at the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, leading Israel's public diplomacy online in six languages, including Persian. We launched a digital campaign in solidarity with the protesters and Mahsa Amini, a young Iranian woman who was killed for showing her hair.
Our "Israel in Persian" accounts exploded. Posts expressing support reached millions. Every day, we received thousands of messages from inside Iran: "Thank you for seeing us, be our voice." For more than four decades, the Islamic Republic has insisted that hatred of Israel is central to Iranian identity. But millions of Iranians have told us otherwise.
A Dutch GAMAAN survey published in 2025 found that 2/3 of Iranians said the government should stop its "destroy Israel" rhetoric, and a similar majority viewed the recent 12-day conflict as between the Iranian regime and Israel, not between Israel and ordinary Iranians.
Israel is home to about 200,000 Iranian Jews. Cyrus the Great liberated the Jews from exile and allowed them to return to Jerusalem, an event recorded in both Jewish and Persian history. That shared past still lives between our peoples. When Iranians rose up, Israelis didn't see enemies in the streets of Tehran. We saw courage. (Iran International)
Gaza
- The Shameful Disinformation over the Gaza Death Toll - Maj. (ret.) Andrew Fox
On Jan. 29, the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz reported, based on an anonymous source, that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had "accepted" the Gaza Health Ministry's (GHM) estimate of 70,000 Palestinian deaths since October 2023. However, there appears to be a significant gap between media narrative and reality. The IDF has outright denied Ha'aretz's report, saying the 70,000 figure "does not reflect official IDF data." Unsurprisingly, this has been conveniently ignored in much of the news coverage.
Everyone agrees the war has been devastating. The real dispute concerns the composition of that death toll. How many of the dead were Hamas combatants or victims of Hamas's own actions, rather than civilians killed by the IDF. By early 2024, the Hamas-run GHM was claiming that 70% of the dead were "women and children." This claim was always nonsense, and is easily disproven just by looking more closely at Hamas's own data. Most of the casualties were, in fact, male, with a disproportionate number of those being of fighting age.
Over a year ago, the Henry Jackson Society published my team's analysis on the GHM's fatality lists. We discovered that Hamas's lists were riddled with errors and non-combat deaths. Individuals' ages and genders were frequently misreported (men were listed as women, adults as children) in ways that artificially inflated the count of female and child victims.
The lists included people who had died before the war - including those killed by Hamas's own actions (such as by misfired militant rockets). Unsurprisingly, the published toll made no mention of any Hamas combatants whatsoever. We also observed that the Gazan death toll encompassed natural deaths, which would have occurred regardless of the war.
While Gazan officials claimed over 440 deaths from malnutrition or starvation during the war, Israel disputes that any deaths from hunger ever occurred. The IDF notes that Hamas likely counted individuals with severe illnesses as "starvation" victims. The upshot remains that the death toll of 70,000 is a composite of many categories of deaths which cannot be attributed entirely to Israel.
The mishandling of this issue has done a huge disservice to both truth and history. Gaza's dead deserve to be remembered accurately, not reduced to pawns in a propaganda contest. We should not fail the innocents lost by obscuring the reason their lives were cut short in the first place: a war that was started by the terrorists of Hamas, in which they did everything they could to place civilians in harm's way.
The writer, a research fellow at the Henry Jackson Society, served for 16 years in the British Army. (Spiked-UK)
Palestinian Arabs
- Abbas's PA Election Plan Defies Reform - Lt.-Col. (res.) Maurice Hirsch
Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas is turning the PA into a Soviet-style democracy in which everyone can vote, but only for one party. The PA is scheduled to hold municipal elections on April 25, 2026, and has issued several decrees in preparation, including one on Jan. 27.
The decree limits participation in the elections to lists and candidates that commit to the PLO platform and its international commitments. Since Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) do not accept the PLO's hegemony, they will be excluded from participating in the elections.
At the same time, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a murderous terrorist organization that has always rejected the Oslo Accords and openly rejects Israel's right to exist, remains to this day a member of the PLO and would be allowed to participate.
Moreover, while Hamas did participate in the PA's 2006 general elections, it boycotted the PA's 2017 and 2021 municipal elections and prevented those elections from taking place in Gaza. Yet Abbas will no doubt point to his success in preventing Hamas participation.
The writer, former director of the Military Prosecution in Judea and Samaria, is director of the Palestinian Authority Accountability Initiative at the Jerusalem Center. (Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs)
Observations:
- The American Constitution enshrined individual rights to freedom of speech, religion, assembly, and thought, regardless of how radical or extreme. Yet these uniquely American liberties have been exploited by its enemies to subvert the U.S. and the West from within. Americans have largely been willfully blind to recognizing that enemy ideologies can eventually undermine U.S. national security and destroy its societal fabric. Why does America continue to struggle to recognize jihadi subversion by Islamist organizations and actors?
- America's Islamic enemies have publicly declared their intention for decades. A 1991 Muslim Brotherhood Memorandum discovered by the FBI reveals this strategy in detail. Authored by Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammed Akram, the blueprint details a "Civilization-Jihadist Process" to destroy Western civilization from within and establish Islamic governance in North America. "The Ikhwan [Brotherhood] must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within." These are not metaphors. They are declarations of war.
- Dr. Harold Rhode describes the foundational doctrine of Islamic warfare in his book Modern Islamic Warfare, which explains how jihadist movements view their struggle as a cosmic battle that cannot cease "until the world be all for Allah." Among both Sunni jihadists and the messianic variety of Shiite jihadists that dominate the Iranian regime leadership, the West represents an adversary to be subdued, and Israel is merely the first, local hurdle in conquering the world for Islam.
- The PLO's original 1964 charter and Hamas's 1988 covenant called for the annihilation of Israel through jihad. Today it is Hamas whose doctrine and political popularity dominate the Palestinian street. The fact that many Americans view the Palestinian cause primarily as rooted in territorial grievance rather than ideological jihad demonstrates the success of their disinformation and deception campaign. Any American policy toward the Palestinians must be conditioned on the explicit and verifiable rejection of jihad, recognition of Israel's permanent right to exist, and adoption of educational curricula free of religious hatred and incitement.
- Most importantly, the U.S. must recognize that Israel's fight is also a battle for Western civilization's future survival, safety, and security.
Moral clarity and a united front between Israel and the U.S. is necessary to defeat jihadist terror and political subversion.
The writer is president of the Jerusalem Center.
|