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In-Depth Issues:
Israel's Strike Against Hamas in Qatar Should Have Come a Long Time Ago - Avi Issacharoff ( Ynet News)
The strike on Hamas leaders abroad was a legitimate and justified move that should have been carried out long ago. Qatar was wrongly granted a status of near immunity early in the war.
How could a country that openly funds and supports the Muslim Brotherhood, hosts Hamas's top leadership responsible for the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, channels billions of dollars into Hamas's coffers, and zealously nurtures its global propaganda arms - primarily through the Al Jazeera network and influence campaigns reaching as far as the White House - become the central mediator between Hamas and Israel?
Egypt is expected to return to center stage as the primary mediator. Egyptian intelligence officials have no affection for Hamas and certainly none for its parent movement, the Muslim Brotherhood, which they regard as an existential threat to President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi's rule.
The writer, a veteran Israeli journalist focusing on Palestinian affairs, is one of the creators of the TV series "Fauda."
Behind Closed Doors, Arab Leaders Pleased to See Qatar's Humiliation - Prof. Kobi Michael ( Israel Hayom)
Arab leaders will rush to condemn Israel and embrace Qatar with soothing words. But it is lip service.
Behind closed doors, they are rubbing their hands in delight, smiling broadly at Qatar's humiliation.
For many of them, Qatar is not just a rival but a dangerous adversary, thanks to its support for the Muslim Brotherhood, jihadist terrorist groups, and destabilization efforts through its Al Jazeera network.
They will be pleased to see Qatar weakened, just as they would welcome Hamas's destruction.
The writer is a senior research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University.
See also Video: The Arab World Wants to See Israel "Finish the Job" Against Hamas ( X-i24News)
The Arab world is not as devastated by Israel's attack on Hamas in Doha as their condemning statements might suggest, said Col. (ret.) Dr. Jacques Neriah, former Deputy Head for Assessment of Israeli Military Intelligence.
"Deep inside they are very happy that Hamas is being eliminated.... They are encouraging, in fact, Israel just to finish the job."
The Qatar Strike Signals a New Era for Israel - Jake Wallis Simons ( Telegraph-UK)
Former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir said in the 1960s: "If we have to have a choice between being dead and pitied, and being alive with a bad image, we'd rather be alive and have the bad image." That sentiment is even more relevant today.
With the attack on Hamas in Qatar, Israel's message is: If we are to be hated, at least let us live. If we cannot be loved, then we must be feared.
If you are bent on killing Jews, nowhere is safe. This military operation shows that Israel is now fully invested in deterrence, whatever the West may think.
Follow the Jerusalem Center on:
Israeli Opposition Leader Lapid: No Two-State Solution in the Next Decade after Oct. 7 ( Jerusalem Post)
Israeli Opposition leader Yair Lapid told a conference in Washington on Wednesday: "There will not be a two-state solution in the next decade because of what happened after October 7, including celebrations in Ramallah on the morning of the massacre."
"The burden of proof moved from us to the Palestinians. Right now, what we learned on October 7 is that we must defend ourselves from people who want to kill us, and they must prove to us they do not, before we start talking about more optimistic versions of the future."
Lapid accused parts of the world of adopting "a terror organization's narrative."
He noted that Israel represents 0.1% of the world's population, yet receives a disproportionate share of condemnations, even though "there were half a million people killed in Syria, in Sudan, in Myanmar."
Why Israel's Strike Against Hamas Was Both Justified and Overdue - Gregg Roman ( Middle East Forum)
The Israeli attack on Hamas in Qatar marked a restoration of moral clarity.
For nearly two years since the Oct. 7 massacres, Hamas's leadership had orchestrated genocide from the comfort of Qatari luxury hotels, protected by the fiction of diplomatic immunity and the shield of a supposed American ally.
Those who plan mass murder cannot claim sanctuary anywhere on earth. This attack should have happened years ago.
Qatar provided an extraterritorial sanctuary where its leadership could direct operations, manage finances, and plan attacks while remaining physically removed from consequences.
This arrangement represents a perversion of both warfare and diplomacy that no civilized nation should tolerate. When Qatar transformed itself into a command center for terrorism, it challenged the fundamental architecture of international order.
When those who order atrocities remain immune from their consequences, this incentivizes maximum violence with minimum personal risk. Israel's strike restored the principle that those who choose war must share its dangers.
By demonstrating that Hamas leaders were vulnerable even in the heart of a wealthy Gulf capital, Israel restored the element of personal risk that constrains extremist behavior.
The message was: choose terror, and you choose to live as a target, regardless of which government provides your refuge.
The writer is executive director of the Middle East Forum.
45 Israeli Embassies Targeted since Oct. 7 - Zvika Klein ( Jerusalem Post)
A senior Middle Eastern security source told the Middle East-America Dialogue (MEAD) in Washington on Tuesday that 45 Israeli embassies and consulates have been attacked worldwide in the two years since Oct. 7, 2023.
The source emphasized that Israel views attacks on its diplomats as attacks on the state itself, and warned that plots against missions often coincide with efforts to target Jewish institutions in the same cities.
Israel's Surprising Economic Resilience - Nimrod Sapir ( Wall Street Journal)
For almost two years, Israel has been embroiled in conflict on seven fronts. Yet its economy has defied expectations and displayed remarkable resilience. It is one of the reasons Israel has been able to fight on.
This resilience is rooted in solid economic fundamentals: a debt-to-GDP ratio of about 60% at the conflict's onset, a roughly 3% unemployment rate, and a relatively low budget deficit.
The Tel Aviv Stock Exchange is among the best-performing markets worldwide.
For three decades, Israel's high-tech sector has been its engine of growth - and it remains so.
Tourism has declined, but exports remain robust. The Bank of Israel is projecting 3.3% growth this year.
The writer is CEO of the Israel Investment Houses Association and a former chief of staff to Israel's finance minister.
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News Resources - North America, Europe, and Asia:
- Israel Attempts to Kill Hamas Leadership in Qatar - Adam Rasgon
Israel attempted to kill senior members of Hamas in an airstrike on Tuesday in Qatar. Hamas said the Israeli strike had failed to kill senior officials in the group.
President Trump said, "This was a decision made by Prime Minister Netanyahu. It was not a decision made by me." He said he had "immediately" directed his Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, to inform the Qataris of the impending attack, but that Witkoff had done so "unfortunately, too late."
"I view Qatar as a strong Ally and friend of the U.S., and feel very badly about the location of the attack," Trump wrote on social media. "I want ALL of the Hostages, and bodies of the dead, released, and this War to END, NOW!"
Israeli officials have vowed to kill Hamas leaders who were involved in the planning of the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel that ignited the war in Gaza. A week ago, Lt.-Gen. Eyal Zamir, the IDF chief of the staff, said: "We are operating across the entire Middle East. Hamas will have no place to hide from us. Wherever we locate them, whether they are senior or junior figures - we strike them all, all the time."
The Prime Minister's Office said, "Today's action against the top terrorist chieftains of Hamas was a wholly independent Israeli operation. Israel initiated it, Israel conducted it, and Israel takes full responsibility."
(New York Times)
See also Israel Strikes Hamas Headquarters Outside of Gaza - Tal Shalev
Israel carried out an attack on Tuesday against the Hamas leadership in Doha, Qatar, the group's headquarters outside of Gaza. The Israel Defense Forces said: "For years, these members of the Hamas leadership have led the terrorist organization's operations, are directly responsible for the brutal October 7th massacre, and have been orchestrating and managing the war against the State of Israel." (CNN)
- Trumps Speaks Twice with Netanyahu after Israeli Strike on Qatar - Alexander Ward
President Trump told Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu in a call on Tuesday that the decision to target Hamas political leaders in Doha, Qatar, wasn't wise. He was angry to learn about the attack as it was occurring from the U.S. military, rather than from Israel, senior U.S. administration officials said. Netanyahu responded that he had a brief window to launch the strikes and took the opportunity.
A second call was more cordial, officials said, as Trump asked Netanyahu if the attack had proven successful. He also emphasized his support for Israel's military campaign to defeat Hamas, the officials said, including a renewed Israeli assault on Gaza City. (Wall Street Journal)
- Israel Strikes Houthi Targets in Yemen - Yomna Ehab
Israel struck the Yemeni capital Sanaa and the northern province of al-Jawf on Wednesday. The Israeli military said it had struck military camps, the headquarters of the Houthi military "propaganda" department, and a fuel storage site.
Sanaa residents told Reuters the attack had targeted a hideout between two mountains that is used as a command and control headquarters. Israel also targeted the Houthi defense ministry, witnesses said.
"The strikes were carried out in response to attacks led by the Houthi terror regime against the State of Israel, during which unmanned aerial vehicles and surface-to-surface missiles were launched toward Israeli territory," the IDF said. (Reuters)
News Resources - Israel and the Mideast:
- Netanyahu: Attack on Hamas in Qatar Was Exactly Like U.S. Targeting Bin Laden in Pakistan
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday: "We remember September 11th. On that day, Islamist terrorists committed the worst savagery on American soil since the founding of the United States. We also have a September 11th. We remember October 7th. On that day, Islamist terrorists committed the worst savagery against the Jewish people since the Holocaust."
"What did America do in the wake of September 11th? It promised to hunt down the terrorists who committed this heinous crime, wherever they may be. And it also passed a resolution in the Security Council of the UN, two weeks later, that said that governments cannot give harbor to terrorists."
"Yesterday, we acted along those lines. We went after the terrorist masterminds who committed the October 7th massacre. And we did so in Qatar which gives safe haven, it harbors terrorists, it finances Hamas, it gives its terrorist chieftains sumptuous villas, it gives them everything. So we did exactly what America did when it went after the al-Qaeda terrorists in Afghanistan and after they went and killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan."
"Now, the various countries of the world condemn Israel....They should applaud Israel for standing up to the same principles and carrying them out."
(Prime Minister's Office)
- IDF Building Two More GHF Aid Sites in Southern Gaza - Lazar Berman
In Rafah, miles inside of Gaza, there are no sounds of war. Almost no buildings are left standing. The city is now a sandy wasteland of broken concrete, twisted metal, and packs of feral dogs. Civilian sedans and pickup trucks drive along the Philadelphi Corridor on the border with Egypt.
Israel is building two new aid distribution sites, which will be handed over to the U.S.- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation in the coming days. They are designed to be "as safe as possible, as short of a distance as possible, for the trucks, and for the people coming in," said Lt.-Col. Nadav Shoshani. The first row of buildings in the al-Mawasi humanitarian area - to which Israel has told civilians in Gaza City to evacuate - are visible from both sites.
The flow of foot traffic through the sites will be clearer and smoother, and changes in the placement and height of sand berms and concrete walls will protect American security guards. To avoid instances in which civilians veered off the defined routes, there are new fences and concrete walls "making it very clear where the routes are, where it's safe to go, where you're supposed to go, and making sure that people don't approach troops."
"The IDF is not in the sites," Shoshani stressed. "No one has been shot in the sites by the IDF. The IDF is fighting terrorists around these sites....The IDF is not targeting anyone picking up food."
The GHF says it has distributed over 161 million meals since May, and almost 1.2 million meals on Wednesday alone. (Times of Israel)
- Civilians Begin to Evacuate Gaza City - Emanuel Fabian
The IDF said Wednesday it would increase its strikes on Gaza City in the coming days as part of its preparations to conquer the city, as it pushed back against Hamas's claims that the humanitarian zone in the south was full.
On Sunday, the IDF ordered residents of the city to evacuate immediately. Tens of thousands have evacuated in the past day.
The IDF Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), Maj.-Gen. Ghassan Alian, wrote in Arabic on Facebook on Wednesday: "Contrary to Hamas's claims, there are available spaces in the humanitarian area for setting up tents. Do not fall for Hamas's lies, as it wants to use you as a human shield." COGAT published graphics showing locations in the humanitarian zone where there were open areas for setting up tents.
Asharq Al-Awsat reported on Wednesday that Hamas leader Izz al-Din Haddad had instructed his fighters to remain in Gaza City. Other terror groups have reportedly warned their operatives that they will be punished if they leave the city.
(Times of Israel)
See also IDF: 200,000 Palestinians Have Left Gaza City - Emanuel Fabian (Times of Israel)
Global Commentary and Think-Tank Analysis:
Strike on Hamas in Qatar
- Hamas Leaders in Qatar Were Blocking Compromise - Yaakov Lappin
An Israeli strike on Tuesday targeted Hamas's senior political-terrorist leadership in Doha, Qatar. Israel said the targeted leaders have been directing the war, are directly responsible for the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre, and that measures were taken to mitigate harm to civilians.
Oded Ailam, a former head of the Counterterrorism Division in the Mossad and currently a researcher at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs, told JNS that the timing of the strike was driven by several factors, including recognition in Israel that the hostage negotiations had reached a dead end.
"Israel is creating a demonstration of intent; that we are serious about what we said - the total elimination of Hamas. And the proof is that we are not afraid to do something we have almost never done before and take responsibility for an aerial kinetic attack on a country that is not defined as an enemy state."
"The idea is to project uncompromising determination. A message to the captors: if you harm the hostages...you will have no place to hide." (JNS)
- Qatar Strike Highlights Israel Unwilling to Negotiate by Hamas's Rules - Zvika Klein
Israeli negotiators believe Hamas was using time is a tactic. One veteran envoy told me that Hamas would "go quiet" on issues that could have been answered in a day, then reappear three, four, and even seven days later with a partial reply that initiated a new loop. Throughout the summer, mediators cycled proposals that required simple yes-or-no answers. Instead, responses from Hamas in Doha typically arrived slowly, often contingent on new side demands. Jerusalem intends to take that leverage away.
In July, Washington began signaling that it was exploring "alternative options" to bring hostages home if the Doha track remained stuck. Tuesday's strike is what "alternative options" look like when diplomacy is treated as a delay tactic. Hamas believed that time favored it, that global opinion and political pressure would keep Israel at the table indefinitely. The talks were being slow-rolled while the narrative battle raged, and that leverage had to change. (Jerusalem Post)
- How Qatar's Policy Endangers U.S. Interests in the Middle East - Lt.-Col. (ret.) Jonathan D. Halevi
The Israeli strike on a Hamas leadership gathering in Qatar's capital, Doha, has drawn international attention to the close ties between Qatar and Hamas, and the threat Qatar poses to American interests in the Middle East. Qatar presents itself as a U.S. ally in the fight against terrorism, claiming it hosts Hamas's office at the U.S.'s request to maintain open communication for promoting peace in the region.
Qatar's policy toward the U.S. is based on strategic deception. Qatar has demonstrated full political support for Hamas, providing nearly $2 billion in aid to Gaza. This aid has been administered by Hamas and has contributed to strengthening its military wing in preparation for the Oct. 7 attack. Hamas leadership viewed Qatar as a close and preferred ally over Egypt, thanks to Qatar's mobilization of its institutions to advance Palestinian goals.
Qatar's financial support continued even as Hamas leadership publicly reiterated its coordination with the Shiite axis of Iran and its proxies - for the "Promise of the Hereafter Battle" aimed at destroying the State of Israel and reshaping the Middle East. Hamas's plan included overthrowing pro-Western regimes in the Middle East and establishing the "Great Islamic Revolution," meaning a caliphate - an Islamic state - on the ruins of Israel and Arab regimes.
The writer is a senior researcher of the Middle East and radical Islam at the Jerusalem Center. (Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs)
- From Mediator to Target: Qatar's Gamble with Hamas Backfires - Dalia Ziada
By striking Hamas leaders in Doha, Israel crossed a threshold that will reshape the power and diplomacy dynamics in the Middle East. For decades, Qatar positioned itself as both a U.S. ally and a supporter of Hamas. It housed the group's leadership, financed its operations, and used Al Jazeera's platform to spin Hamas's terrorism into "resistance."
It also aimed for Western approval by acting as a mediator, essential to hostage negotiations. That fragile balancing act is now broken.
Commentators lamented: how could Israel dare to strike inside the borders of a "kind-hearted mediator" like Qatar? Just one day earlier, Al Jazeera celebrated a Hamas-claimed bus attack in Jerusalem. Hamas leaders in Doha praised it as a "heroic act" and called for more such assaults. When Hamas carried out the horrific Oct. 7 attack on Israel, Al Jazeera live-broadcasted Hamas leaders in Doha celebrating the attack with a prayer of gratitude.
Qatar cannot host, fund, and empower the masterminds of terrorism while feigning surprise when those very terrorists bring Israeli fire onto Qatari soil. A state cannot sponsor terrorists while expecting immunity from the consequences. If Qatar enables Hamas to attack a neighboring sovereign state, then Israel will inevitably extend the battlefield to Qatar itself.
For Israel, this strike was a declaration of a new deterrence doctrine. Hamas leaders once believed they were untouchable. Israel has altered the rules of the game. Now, no sanctuary is guaranteed. This sends shockwaves throughout the region. Turkey, Lebanon, and even European capitals that quietly support Islamist networks must face the new reality. Israel has shown it is ready to go after Hamas not only in Gaza or the West Bank.
Qatar's claim to be a mediator now lies in ruins. Mediation only holds credibility when the mediator is impartial or at least not actively fueling one side. Qatar's financial pipelines to Hamas and its ideological promotion of Islamist narratives disqualify it from that role. Every "ceasefire deal" in Gaza over the past two years that Qatar championed was less about achieving peace and more about throwing Hamas a lifeline. Israel has redrawn the map of accountability in the Middle East.
The writer, an Egyptian scholar, is a Senior Fellow at the Jerusalem Center. (Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs)
- Ex-U.S. Envoy: "Israel Has the Right to Strike Terrorists Who Are Trying to Kill Israelis and Destroy the State of Israel" - Zvika Klein
Elliott Abrams, a veteran American diplomat who served as White House deputy national security advisor, where he supervised U.S. policy in the Middle East, told the Jerusalem Post on Tuesday that Israel was within its rights to target Hamas leaders in Doha. "The principle we should support is that Israel has the right to strike terrorists who are trying to kill Israelis and destroy the State of Israel. They don't gain immunity just because they are in one capital as opposed to another."
Abrams predicted limited political fallout and said the episode should push Doha to reconsider hosting Hamas leaders. "Qatar as negotiator or intermediary is not trustworthy. I'd much rather see Egypt as the interlocutor." He said talks can continue without Doha. "The notion that this means there can't be a negotiation is wrong." (Jerusalem Post)
The Gaza War
- A Siege on Gaza City Is Not a War Crime - Maj. (ret.) John Spencer
Israel has called for the mass evacuation of civilians from Gaza City, signaling that the final battle for the city is inevitable. As the disinformation campaign intensifies, accusations that sieges are illegal or immoral will surge. They are not.
A siege, properly defined, is the surrounding and isolation of an enemy force to cut off supplies, reinforcement and maneuver, usually to compel surrender. It remains permitted under the laws of armed conflict when directed against combatants and undertaken with precautions to minimize harm to civilians. Indeed, it can be the best way to reduce civilian casualties.
In almost every major urban operation of the last generation, the U.S. and its partners have surrounded a city, urged civilians to leave - and then began a well-planned attack. Given Israel's record thus far, its attack on Gaza City will be lawful, moral and necessary. The IDF will proceed like any modern military facing an entrenched enemy in dense cities.
No government can allow a terrorist army to maintain a safe haven in a dense city while holding hostages and firing rockets. If Hamas refuses to release captives and surrender its grip on Gaza City, Israel is justified in completing its siege and assault until Hamas is defeated.
The writer is chair of urban warfare studies at West Point's Modern War Institute.
(Washington Post)
- Hamas Fights for Power Built on a Mountain of Corpses - Salem Alketbi
Anyone who examines the rhetoric of Hamas will quickly discover it is a project of organized death. It is a system that turns blood into political currency and suicide into a collective identity. Hamas was built on the lethal formula: "If you kill, you are a hero; if you are killed, you are a martyr in heaven." This equation leaves no room for an ordinary person to choose their own life, dignity, or future. In their world, a hero is one who blows himself up among others because he is guaranteed a direct path to heaven.
The true tragedy of this dark and regressive ideology is that death is an absolute obligation. Followers must either kill or be killed. Every tragedy is turned into publicity. A grieving mother is not left to mourn; she is forced to stand heroically before the cameras, shouting that her sons are all potential martyrs. A widow is turned into a symbol of piety and endurance.
As for the children, their fate is predetermined. They are the "cubs of the cause," and their next step is not toward school but down the path to another death. In essence, Hamas operates death factories, producing the dead while preparing the living to be their ready replacements.
Hamas invests in the business of death, which it sells to the gullible and the deluded. The more corpses pile up, the higher Hamas's political stock rises. For Hamas, victory is not peace. It is the rising death toll. This perverse logic desecrates the sanctity of human life. Hamas is fighting for power built on a mountain of corpses. It is not liberating a people; it is bleeding them dry.
The writer is a UAE political analyst.
(Jerusalem Post)
Israel and the West
- Gesture Politics Won't Help Palestinians - Bret Stephens
This month, France, Canada, Australia and possibly Britain will recognize a Palestinian state at the UN General Assembly. And the government of Spain has imposed an arms embargo on Israel. Will a single Gazan be helped in any meaningful way by any of this? No. Will Israel be hurt? Not particularly. Will it exacerbate Western antisemitism? More than likely.
After Madrid announced its embargo, I wondered what weapons, if any, did it sell to Israel. None, as far as I can discover. But, at least until this month, Spain was an eager customer for Israeli military equipment, to the tune of over one billion euros between Oct. 2023 and last April. My advice to Israel, let Madrid hope that its anti-Israel posturing will keep the terrorist threat at bay.
Somewhere near the center of the Israeli psyche lies the thought: The world is out to get us. And much that's happened since Oct. 7, 2023, has proved them right: Being accused of genocide the same month they were grotesquely massacred. Watching a pogrom unfold on the streets of Amsterdam. Seeing elderly Jews burned alive in Colorado.
Diaspora Jews are living through the worst era of open antisemitism since the 1930s. The leaders of Canada, France, and Australia are contributing to a climate of anti-Jewish demonization by treating Israel as a quasi-pariah state whose presumptive supporters can be viewed as guilty accomplices. In their virtue-signaling foreign policy, they are inflicting genuine harm on their own Jewish citizens. (New York Times)
- Israel Is Remaking the Map - Abe Greenwald
In the pre-Oct. 7 world, legitimate governments let terrorists kill a little, then hide a little, negotiate a little, and kill a little more. Israel was expected to play along. In the world being born, Israel kills terrorists, wherever they are. This is to be a world of greater moral coherence, swifter justice, and more enduring security - a saner, more civilized world.
You can board flotillas, declare phantom states, boycott companies, publish blood libels and propaganda images, blackball artists, re-litigate the entire history of the 20th century, and even attack Jews on the street. But none of it will stop the proud men and women of Israel from ridding the world of your terrorist heroes.
Instead of Israel being "erased from the map," as Iran's leaders have long promised, Israel is redrawing the map and erasing its enemies as it goes along. In taking out its enemies, Israel is also taking out enemies of the U.S.
I no longer feel compelled to defend Israel for anything it's done since October 7, 2023. If you find yourself defending the very idea of Israel's survival, you're wasting precious breath. You're having an argument that doesn't matter. The only argument that matters is the one Israel is making in the skies and on the battlefield, because eliminating terrorist organizations and terror sponsors is a win for decency and humanity.
I'm praising Israel for its strength and clarity, and for its steadfast vision of a world that refuses to accept terrorists as anything but targets in a gun sight.
The writer is the executive editor of Commentary.
(Commentary)
Radical Islam
- To Defeat Radical Islamist Terror, the Ideology of Hatred Must Be Uprooted - Ahmed Charai
Fighting terrorism is not merely a battle against gunmen, militias, or armies. It is a battle against a death-worshipping ideology, a doctrine that teaches martyrdom as glory, hatred as duty, and murder as salvation. Until that poison is confronted at its root, every fallen terrorist will be replaced, and every apparent victory will prove to be only an illusion.
Hamas could vanish from Gaza tomorrow - its tunnels flooded, its commanders killed, its arsenals dismantled, and still, the threat of terror would not end. The fighters would be replaced, the weapons restocked, the hatred reborn. Why? Because terror lives in a death-worshipping ideology. An ideology more resilient than armies, more viral than propaganda, more enduring than regimes. That radical Islamist doctrine, seeded by the Muslim Brotherhood nearly a century ago, remains undefeated, and no battlefield victory will last.
The theory behind President Trump's 2019 "Peace to Prosperity" plan was: prosperity is the antidote to extremism. Build businesses instead of bunkers. Offer hope instead of hatred. Replace dependence with dignity.
And yet, on Oct. 7, Hamas's slaughter of nearly 1,200 Israelis was not just an act of war. It was a declaration that no economic promise, no diplomatic vision, could substitute for ideology. Because ideology - not poverty, not unemployment - is what fuels the cult of terror.
Terrorism is not born from deprivation but from indoctrination. Millions of impoverished people around the world do not strap bombs to their chests. What distinguishes the terrorist is not his misery - it is the poison of radical Islamism poured into his mind. It teaches that martyrdom is salvation, violence is duty, killing is sacred. It sanctifies death and sells it to teenagers as glory.
The writer is the publisher of the Jerusalem Strategic Tribune.
(National Interest)
Observations:
- For decades, Israel's military has operated within the constraints of Western diplomatic norms. These include measured responses, careful escalation ladders, and endless rounds of negotiations that often reward the very actors who orchestrate violence against Israeli civilians. Tuesday's strike against Hamas leaders in Qatar may mark a fundamental shift: Israel is speaking the language the Middle East actually understands.
- Dr. Dan Diker, president of the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs, explained how Western powers have consistently tried to impose their own cultural framework onto Middle Eastern dynamics. This approach treats negotiations as good-faith exercises between rational actors, where compromise is a virtue and escalation is failure. However, this misreads how power operates in the Middle East.
- Hamas's leadership has spent decades exploiting this Western mindset. The result is a perverse system where delays in hostage negotiations are rewarded with international pressure on Israel, rather than consequences for Hamas, which twists the international media narrative to its liking.
- The traditional Western approach created what Diker called a false assumption "that Israel wouldn't dare attack Hamas leadership on Qatari soil because it assumed that the Americans would prevent it." This assumption became Hamas's shield. Yet, as Diker noted, the Middle East "only understands victory and defeat."
- This isn't cultural stereotyping but rather a recognition that this region is different. In a region where state collapse is common and tribal dynamics remain strong, strength signals legitimacy, while weakness invites aggression. Rather than seeking Western approval for each escalation, Israel is demonstrating that it will act unilaterally to protect its interests.
- Diker also pointed to the alignment between the leaders of Israel and the U.S. in "defeating radical extremist Islamism." Middle Eastern actors closely watch the U.S.-Israel dynamic. When they see daylight between Washington and Jerusalem, it emboldens rejectionist strategies. When they see coordination, it forces recalculation of what's possible.
- When Middle Eastern actors believe their opponent is truly committed to total victory rather than managed conflict, they begin calculating exit strategies rather than endurance contests.
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