Democracy Dies in Broad Daylight

Posted on March 25, 2026 | Leave a comment

(First published at Israelnationalnews.com)

Absent from any discussion on the future of Iran is democratization, and with good reason. Iran, from ancient times until today, has no history of democracy or even democratic aspirations. Some Iranians may yearn for freedoms as Westerners understand them but democracy as “rule of the people” is utterly foreign to them. It is also because democracy is increasingly difficult to sustain, as we are today experiencing in Israel.

The struggling Washington Post publishes on its masthead the self-serving but hopeful phrase “democracy dies in darkness.” Maybe, but in Israel where we always strive to do better, democracy is dying in broad daylight. Israel’s claim to be the “only democracy in the Middle East” has become increasingly farcical. Sure, Israel has elections, like Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, and Jordan have, but true power is not wielded by the elected officials but by an unelected power structure that barely tolerates the government, humors the legislature, runs roughshod over people’s individual rights, and is beyond accountability. Oh, and all the while accusing the government of being a “threat to democracy.” Talk about people who need to buy a mirror and take a gander at themselves.

Let us count the ways that the instruments of the deep state – the Supreme Court, the police and prosecution, and elements of the media – undermine democracy, especially because they cannot win elections. Sadly, this is only a partial list.

The police and prosecution eavesdropped on thousands of Israel citizens not accused of any wrongdoing, and without any court approval. They gathered and still retain personal information on many of them in the hope of finding something incriminating that the authorities could use to blackmail them into framing PM Netanyahu for something, anything. Nothing will come of this.

Attempts by the government to investigate these crimes have been thwarted by the Supreme Court, which is attempting to cover up its involvement and that of the “fired-but-still-reigning” Attorney General, Gali Baharav-Miara. She, in a remarkable exercise of judicial malfeasance, has been granted 23 adjournments in order to delay appointment of a committee to investigate the mass eavesdropping, thus delaying the case to the point of meaninglessness. In this and other areas, the AG and the Court are hoping to run out the clock past the next elections where they pray (if they pray at all) that a friendly left-wing government will sweep away all these charges. The Supreme Court has protected her from rightful termination for misconduct in office, even though no statute gives it the authority to do that.

The legal establishment has waged lawfare against the prime minister for well over a decade, with evidence fabricated, witnesses threatened, prosecutors suborning perjury, and the witch hunt dragging on for years. It has perfected the system of neutering disfavored politicians, appointees, or bureaucrats by holding over their heads bogus investigations facilitated by tendentious and false leaks to the media.

Meanwhile, the AG’s son was credibly accused (it is caught on camera, after all) of shamelessly stealing another soldier’s bullet proof vest, even refusing to return it after no charges were filed against him because of collusion between the AG and the Military Prosecutor’s office. Who knew that her self-proclaimed immunity extends to her son as well?

The former Military Prosecutor was credibly accused of fabricating evidence and leaking it to the media, a video that besmirched our soldiers’ names across the world. She was forced to resign after accidentally being outed by an employee undergoing a routine polygraph, but this only happened after the Military Prosecutor informed the Court that the results of her investigation did not expose the leaker. This was quite understandable, as she was the leaker, and was granted the right to investigate herself, which the Court willfully permitted until she was otherwise exposed. Her case is now pending, but (as above) it is pending its way towards quiet disappearance in the mischievous murkiness of the deep state.

The AG and the Supreme Court have asserted powers unknown to comparable officials in any functioning democracy. They fabricate their own laws and simultaneously void or thwart laws passed by the Knesset, Israel’s elected legislature, which has been successfully marginalized as a substantive branch of government. They operate under the risible legal theory spawned by Aharon Barak that “everything is justiciable,” something also unprecedented in legal annals. The AG and Court have arrogated themselves the right to pass judgment on every legislation, every policy, every initiative, and every appointment, even when they run afoul of no law but simply reflect the priorities of the government elected by the people.

Thus, the Court functions without any limits on standing, allowing every malcontent to sue the government even when he has suffered no personal injury but simply because he doesn’t like the government’s policies – for which they, not he, were elected to promote. Judges routinely ignore conflicts of interest, sitting on cases involving relatives and occasionally even cases in which they have monetary interests. Apparently, there is no equivalent in Hebrew for the English concept of “judicial restraint.”

For example, the law is explicit that the State Comptroller can investigate anything and everything. Nothing is beyond his purview. Yet, the High Court illegally ordered the State Comptroller to halt his investigation of the failures of October 7, because, apparently, they did not like where his investigation was heading. (He allegedly was finding fault with their preferred heroes and little fault with their designated villains.) But no existing statute justifies this Court decision.

Similarly, Ronen Bar, the failed head of the Shin Bet who ruled out any possibility of a Hamas attack on October 7, also refused to be fired. And when even the Court could not prevent his dismissal, his successor, David Zini, appointed by the only body authorized by law to appoint the head of the Shin Bet – the government – had numerous obstacles placed in his way, had his assumption to office delayed for months on the most specious grounds, has been politically, journalistically, and legally harassed since assuming office, and the denizens of the Deep State are actively seeking to depose him even now.

Indeed, every government appointment is scrutinized not for legal disqualification but for crass political purposes: will this person advance or impede the interests of the deep state? If the latter, the appointment will be delayed indefinitely, to the point of meaninglessness.

The same pertains to government decisions. Consider, for example, the government’s ordered closure of Galei Tzahal, the Army radio station, announced months ago to occur next week. Not too long ago, a conservative Galatz director balanced the left-wing hosts with an equal number of right-wing hosts. Had he fired the left-wing hosts, the court would have overturned his decision as a “threat to free speech.” When he was replaced, a new director dismissed all the right-wing hosts, who were deemed a “threat to democracy.” But Israel is the only country in the world whose army runs a radio station, much less a partisan, anti-government, and too frequently anti-army radio station. No law prevents the defense minister from shuttering the station; it is a branch of the military like any other branch. But the Supreme Court, acting in its role as High Court of the Deep State and defender of the radical left, has now estopped it, hoping to drag out the proceedings past the next elections and rendering the decision moot. Safe prediction: Galei Tzahal will not be closed anytime soon.

Just as the Court insists that the government subsidize the left wing Galei Tzahal, it is even more undemocratic, if not unconscionable, that the public pays for Reshet Bet, a leftist radio station. Israel TV’s flagship Channel 12 is also government subsidized, and its leftist news division is relentlessly anti-government. Any attempt to reform it by balancing its commentators between right and left, or by letting it privatize and compete in the free market with other networks, is aborted as a “threat to free speech” and a “threat to democracy.” Even the non-astute citizen can grasp that any endeavor that weakens the leftist, secularist segment of society and strengthens the rightist, traditional segment of society, is immediately depicted as a “threat to free speech and democracy.”

To be sure, even a left-wing media has its place. But that place need not be eternally subsidized by the taxpayer, especially those who find its offerings and commentary repugnant. The government should get out of the media business, period. It should be obvious that these left-wing, government-subsidized outlets could not survive if they were forced to compete in the marketplace; that is why the Deep State protects them like an etrog. Forcing taxpayers to subsidize only leftist media is a travesty.

Similarly, two years ago, the Government cut off all ties with the radical left newspaper Haaretz and even ordered the cessation of its subsidized distribution to various government ministries. This is understandable, considering that its publisher has called Arab terrorists “freedom fighters” and one of its columnists recently termed the State of Israel “the greatest danger to world peace of any country.” (If all Tucker Carlson did every day was read the lies from Haaretz, he would not have to concoct his own lies.) Haaretz is one of the most anti-Israel, anti-Jewish publications in the world. Naturally, the Court ordered the Government to resume its subsidies.

This has nothing to do with free speech. Not a few public officials call for the closure of privately funded, right-wing Channel 14. Those who think that cannot happen should recall the closure of Arutz-7, the first popular right-wing organ. Those who think that the expulsion of Jews from Judea and Samaria by a leftwing government is impossible should recall Gush Katif. Those who think that the left does not still pine for a Palestinian state should recall the delusions of Oslo that are all alive and well in the febrile minds of the unrepentant dreamers of a secular, progressive, state of all its citizens, non-Jewish Israel. It is delusional to think that the Hamas invasion or the wars with Iran and Hezbollah has disabused the radical left of its fantasies are starry-eyed as it is to think that the legal establishment that investigates itself and mysteriously never finds any wrongdoing will ultimately be brought to justice.

Elections have been rendered meaningless as real power is held by the courts and unelected bureaucrats who cannot be fired or replaced without permission of the elites. The only virtue of elections is that it enables a right-wing government to be a partial brake on the excesses of the Court, the exact opposite of how a democracy is supposed to function. A left-wing government buttressed by a left-wing Court would be catastrophic, an unchecked behemoth that will undoubtedly oppress right wing and religious Jews who will lack any recourse.

It goes on and on. The AG wants to cancel Itamar Ben Gvir – an act devoid of merit, legal precedent, or statutory authority. Surely, the Election Commission will find some way to ban him in the future. The Court is compelling the IDF to integrate women in combat into mixed units, which will inevitably result in yeshiva students refusing to serve in the tank or artillery corps, a suicidal triumph of rigid, radical feminist ideology over Halacha, efficiency, and battlefield success. The Court demanded years ago that Gazans be allowed to approach the border unhindered and unchallenged, itself one of the proximate causes of the colossal failure of October 7, and one which will also be covered up. And not content with its domestic and military interventions, the Court has ordered that mixed prayers be allowed at a sub-divided Kotel, a mockery of Jewish law and all that is holy. If they feel so strongly about it, maybe the Court should order the same at Al-Aksa.

And do not be surprised if the Deep State cooks up a way to disqualify PM Netanyahu from running in the next election, on some pretext, with the goal of so dispiriting the right wing that people see no purpose in voting, the only way the left can win in Israel. By the time it happens, it will be too late to respond, and the elites know whatever turmoil erupts will die down as soon as a left-wing government is in place.

The problem is that currently there is little hope of changing the system regardless of who is elected in the fall. The elites have carved out for themselves an infrastructure of power that is impregnable through ordinary democratic processes, short of a revolution. The judges cannot be impeached, essentially appoint their replacements, they shield corrupt bureaucrats who serve their purposes and harass honest ones who do not. There are no checks or balances on them. And in a fashion quite evocative of North Korea, the most undemocratic party in Israel – the one that aspires to deprive most of the citizenry of basic rights – calls itself the Democrats. It has no faith in the demos – the people who actually vote – but only in the crats, the ruling class.

Eventually, there will be a constitutional crisis, in which the government and the people who elected it – the majority of the country – simply refuse to enforce the Court’s arbitrary dictates or the AG’s capricious predilections. In a real sense, that crisis is already upon us, obscured only by the necessities of an existential war.

We should not be concerned with democracy in Iran, a pipedream even for optimists. We should be more concerned about the fate of democracy in Israel, dying a daily slow death before our eyes, in broad daylight. And we should pray for the day when “Zion shall be redeemed with justice, and her repentant ones with righteousness” (Yeshayahu 1: 27), may that day come soon.

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Iran Away

Posted on March 12, 2026 | Comments Off on Iran Away

(First published at Israelnationalnews.com)

We could be on the brink of a profound historic change in the Middle East that will set it on the path to peace, prosperity, goodwill, harmony, tolerance, and mutual respect for all countries. Or not.

The unprecedented cooperation between the United States and Israel – a melding of the militaries, to a great extent – reflects several positive developments. It is an achievement for both President Trump and PM Netanyahu, two leaders routinely vilified by large segments of their population and the world, who both perceived threats to their countries and rather than just shrilly warn against it and make idle threats, acted in a bold and audacious way. We can even forgive Trump’s claim of credit for killing the Ayatollah, notwithstanding there weren’t US planes over Iran at the time of that initial attack. Such is the way of the showman.

It also should not be overlooked how these two leaders unflinchingly defined evil as evil and went to war against it. This is not to be taken for granted in a world where evildoers wage psychological and propaganda warfare in order to blur the distinction between good and evil, if not to declare such notions completely obsolete. The obliteration of the distinction between objective good and objective evil plagues Western and secular society and is one of the catalysts for the unrest on college campuses and the moral muddle that afflicts so many young people.

This collaboration ultimately reflects the commitments of both nations and their citizenry to a world that is ordered on moral grounds as well as to a repudiation of the Jew hatred that is gaining strength in the United States and animates so many people in this region.

Nevertheless, fighting side by side should not obscure the fact that each nation went to war for different though equally valid reasons. As such, it is likely that the United States will want to end the war sooner than will Israel.

Israel embarked on this campaign as a classic war of self-defense. The threat from Iran was not “imminent,” but rather constant. Israel has been in a continuous state of war with Iran since the early 1980’s with the creation of Hezbollah. Iran, through its various proxies in the region and their tentacles across the world, has been plotting Israel’s demise since then, murdering Jews and Israelis wherever we may be found. A state does not have immunity because it masks its malevolent actions behind the subordinates it funds, trains, and dispatches. The unremitting menace of Iran had to be confronted; it took decades of terror but finally the battle was joined.

The United States went to battle against Iran not because it perceived an imminent threat, even though Iran has engaged in terror against the US since 1979 – kidnappings, murders, assassination plots against American leaders and politicians, etc. The US war with Iran is a classic preventative war, a war meant to be fought on terms favorable to the attacker to ward off a genuine and tangible future menace. Forty-seven years of chanting “Death to America” eventually, from Iran’s perspective, reached the wrong audience (i.e., President Trump), who took those threats and Iran’s nuclear and ballistic weapons program seriously. Iran has paid and continues to pay a heavy price for that verbal indiscretion and its malign designs against civilization. Its new leader may also be supreme, which does not necessarily mean durable.

Both grounds for initiating an aggressive attack – a present threat with actual hostilities or a preventative war – are inherently moral and legitimate but engender two different objectives. The US is interested in destroying or at least impeding the Iranian program for the foreseeable future, thus removing even a longer-term threat from America’s horizon. That is one reason regime change in Iran is desired by the US but is not indispensable to its mission.

For Israel, regime change – a shift to an Iranian government that may not be enthusiastic Zionists but at least does not consist of obsessive Jew haters and fanatical mass murderers – is a primary goal of the war. It pays to recall that Iran’s deposed Shah was friendly to Israel relative to the region, but not overly warm. Relations on the surface were cordial but the Shah rarely deviated from the Arab consensus at the time. He sold oil to Israel but also had ties with the PLO, condemned the Israeli “occupation,” and called repeatedly for full withdrawal. Like Turkey, another non-Arab but Muslim state that had ties with Israel but not necessarily warm ones, Iran under the Shah had relations with Israel that were benign only in comparison to those of the psychopaths that overthrew him.

The Shah’s son and putative heir is certainly friendlier to Israel but we should not overestimate his standing or popularity in Iran. Again, the few who remember his father’s autocracy favorably do so only when compared to the horrors and monsters that followed him.

This bespeaks the current dilemma facing Israel and the United States. The second reason why regime change is not indispensable to the US military mission is because regime change cannot be effectuated by a foreign army, certainly not from aerial bombings alone, and not from an army of thousands trying to impose its will on a nation of 91,000,000 people – not all of whom are amenable to change.

The conventional wisdom in the West is that Iranians overwhelmingly reject the rule of the Ayatollahs and their monomaniacal, virulent interpretation of Islam. The vast majority of Iranians, we are told, yearn to be free of the rule of the mullahs would like nothing better than a secular Iran within a Muslim framework, such as existed under the Shah’s rule, the better to pursue a good material life. Polls, apparently, show that rule by the mullahs is supported by perhaps 10% of the population, which is not that much, even if in raw numbers it is larger than the population of Israel.

And what if the polls are wrong? What if it is not 10% of the population but 20% or 30% – in other words, tens of millions of fanatics, and that percentage – granted, a minority – is still the only portion of the population that is armed? Under that scenario, regime change becomes less and less likely.

Assuming that 30,000 protesting Iranians were murdered by the regime in the last few months, and myriads more arrested, and many not arrested, that means that barely .001% of the population took to the streets. That is a sobering figure. Policy should not be based on projection – how would we feel if we lived under such a tyranny? – but on reality. A true mass movement of Iranians to overthrow the regime and restore some sort of normalcy has not yet materialized, perhaps because it presently can’t, or perhaps because it does not exist. We can wish for its existence but we cannot wish such an opposition into existence.

The allure of radical Islam should not be underestimated as it has taken root in much of the world and threatens much of the rest. Iran and Turkey have fallen under its sway but each Arab country – even moderate ones – must try to suppress the radicals who live among them, and they do so with varying degrees of success. Europe is overrun with radical Muslims, including large sections of Britain, France, Belgium, Germany, and elsewhere. And radical Islam is a growing menace in the United States as well, even when the face of it has a pleasant smile. Note that the extremists – several of whom sit in the US Congress – are mostly able to preclude any responsible discussion of its dangers by accusing all skeptics and challengers of Islamophobia.

The entire world view of the radical Muslim is permeated with the imperative to propagate Islam even at the cost of one’s own life. It thus becomes difficult to see how this regime – and whoever survives to lead it – can surrender. Even the Nazis surrendered when their ideology collapsed and Germany was overrun. Do the Iranians have a Gorbachev who oversaw the demise of the Soviet Union rather than annihilate his own people? The opposite seems to be the case. Mass murder of their own civilians – not to mention of the infidels across the globe – is the price they joyfully pay to spread their understanding of their faith.

In this, the Iranian leadership is more akin to Imperial Japan, which would not have surrendered to end World War II absent the US atomic bombs that destroyed two major cities with the threat (hollow, as it was) of more to come. Japan would have fought to the last man, a volatile combination of religion and nationalism.

For Israel, regime change is an obvious desideratum, because the survival of this regime in any form will only make it more extreme, if such a thing is possible. For the US, regime change will require a greater commitment of troops and resources than even the Trump administration is willing to provide. What then lies ahead?

As Yogi Berra said, it is difficult to make predictions, especially about the future. It is more likely that the regime will somehow survive than that Reza Pahlavi will show up one day and be crowned the new Shah. But the most optimistic yet still realistic scenario envisions someone from the military – not the Revolutionary Guards – seizing power and quashing the radical mullah movement. This doesn’t transform Iran into a Western democracy but it might enable its decent citizens to remodel their country into an exporter of oil and spices and not terror. The fear that any new radical leader will be decapitated should be a deterrent to normal human beings but might not be applicable in the context of radical Islam. Nonetheless, the present is thus an opportune time for such a military leader to assert authority, especially as the Iranian military will otherwise be totally devastated.

Until that happens, Israel should destroy as much of the Iranian infrastructure as possible, including the oil installations, despite American objections. A poor, weak, and bankrupt Iran poses a limited threat in the short term, and such would also starve its proxies of the funding and support they require to wage their relentless war against Israel. We should be calling every day for the professional military – those not beholden to radical Islam – to step forward and save Iran from devastation.

We should also realize that even the complete defeat of Iran – including regime change and the opening of a Chabad House in Tehran – does not mean an end to Israel’s enemies. New foes are already on the horizon – Turkey, Qatar – just as the possibility of new alliances with other Arab nations exists as well. Then again, a defanged Iran could also mean that those Arab nations that drew close to us because they feared Iran will have less incentive to ally with Israel. Who knows?

The book of Shoftim (Judges) states several times after our enemies were temporarily defeated “and the land was quiet,” for forty years, even for eighty years. If only! In every generation we can weaken Amalek but full victory awaits the coming of Messiah. That is encouraging – along with a more sensible leadership that, one hopes, has purged itself from failed conceptziyot, a military whose feats with G-d’s help astound the world, and a resilient and brave civilian population that cannot be cowered and intimidated by wicked enemies but grows ever stronger and more faithful with each new challenge.

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Tucker Unhinged

Posted on February 24, 2026 | 1 comment

(First published at Israelnationalnews.com)

Ambassador Mike Huckabee must have the patience of a saint; it is the only way to explain his serenity during his interview with Tucker Carlson. Huckabee was imperturbable, unflappable. Carlson, by contrast, has the demeanor of a deranged person, with a demonic laugh that erupts at inappropriate times for the oddest reasons. He speaks in spurts and flits from topic to topic without any coherence.

Carlson also has the inflated ego of the narcissist, bent out of shape because PM Netanyahu rejected his entreaties for an interview. Who is Carlson after all but a fired TV host who now has his own podcast like a million other people? Today he has many listeners because hatred sells but that well will eventually run dry. Other haters will compete for his audience, at least until they get real jobs that take up their time.

He is also quite scatterbrained. Huckabee is the US Ambassador to Israel; what connection does he have to Jeffrey Epstein or the Epstein files? None. So why badger Huckabee about them? As Ben Shapiro points out, Carlson is a devotee of the “Just Asking Questions” copout, by which Carlson normalizes nuts and haters of all stripes by interviewing them, asking questions but no follow-ups or challenges, thus allowing them to spew their hatred unconstrained by facts or decency.

Carlson has been forced to apologize for several wild statements, including his declared hatred for Christian Zionists but also for accusing President Herzog for befriending Jeffrey Epstein and visiting the infamous island. Herzog strenuously objected, claiming he never met Epstein even once (it is good to know that there are some Jews who had no dealings with Epstein), and Carlson apologized for his accusation that was entirely baseless and slanderous. So why make it?

It is fair to ask: how friendly was Tucker Carlson with Jeffrey Epstein? How much money did Epstein lend him? How many times did Carlson visit the island and are the reports of their close association true? I have no evidence at all – but I am Just Asking Questions. What a perverse game. It is a devious way of spreading lies without being accountable.

I believe Carlson when he says he is not an anti-Semite. Why would anyone have anything against Semites? What did the Semites ever do to offend anyone? But I do believe he hates Jews and Israel and his use of certain code words and phrases – almost one a minute – betrayed his animus.

Israel is a “police state.” Christians are persecuted. He is “paying” for Israel’s crimes through his tax dollars.  Israel committed genocide on his dime and murders children. He is obsessed with Israel’s right to exist, as he is for no other country. The Israeli government “shields child molesters.” Netanyahu’s parents did not speak Hebrew (!). Netanyahu has no claim to the land of Israel because he is not religious. Carlson has no idea what “from the river to the sea” means. The United States went to war in Iraq because of Israel and for Israel, and Netanyahu was the one who talked George Bush into regime change in Iraq. (Alas, for Carlson, Netanyahu was not the Prime Minister of Israel then, nor during the entire Bush Presidency, and wasn’t even in government when Muslim Arabs – not Israelis – attacked America on September 11, 2001.) There are more Christians in Israel than there are in Qatar (unlike Carlson’s assertion to the contrary) and unlike in Carlson’s patron Qatar, Israeli Christians are full citizens while Christians in Qatar are mostly not.

He did raise three questions for which he could have received better answers, not that his mind is open to answers. He is fanatically obsessed with the Law of Return, something that to him smacks of racism and rabid nationalism. To be fair, he contrasts that with America’s open borders until recently, but why blame Israel because the demographics of the United States and Europe are swiftly changing?

Carlson asked: what is a Jew? And what right do the Jewish people have to the land of Israel? Is Jewishness an ethnicity or a religious affiliation?

To the latter question, Huckabee properly answered “both,” not that Carlson could understand or would accept that. But it needs elaboration, as this is something that perplexes Gentiles. The Jewish people are a religio-nation. We have a dual identity, given to us by G-d. The Torah states (Shemot 6:7): “I will take you to be My people and I will be for you G-d.” We are both an ethnic group and a religion, and in both capacities we were granted a relatively small territory on earth in which we were mandated to build a holy state.

A Jew born of a Jewish mother, or converted according to halacha, is a Jew, a member of both the religion and the nation. We are heirs to the land of Israel through the Bible (as Huckabee pointed out repeatedly) and via international law and organizations (as Huckabee also pointed out repeatedly, to no avail.) In another whopper of an error, Carlson insisted that the Balfour Declaration was not enshrined in international law, apparently unaware that it was adopted by the League of Nations that awarded the mandate over the land of Israel to Britain on that basis.

But Carlson was also extremely mystified by Huckabee’s assertion of our biblical claims to the land of Israel, which, accordingly, should give Israel rights to all the land from the Nile to the Euphrates (we can call that “from the river to the river.”) Huckabee deflected – Israel is not claiming Jordan, Iraq, Syria, etc. – but there is a better answer. The Bible proposes several maps for the land of Israel. G-d delineated one for Avraham – from the river to the river (note that the “River of Egypt” does not necessarily mean the Nile). But at the end of Bamidbar (Chapter 34), the Torah spells out the borders of conquest that adhere more closely to Israel’s current borders, save for a sliver of land in southern Lebanon and east of the Jordan River. The conquest of Yehoshua resulted in still a third map that is different from the other two, and King David’s borders were even larger.

The truth is that the borders of Israel according to the Torah are somewhat fluid, much like the borders of the United States when independence was declared almost two centuries ago. The original thirteen colonies occupied territory mainly along the Atlantic coast but the US extended its borders to the Pacific Ocean and beyond in accordance with the “manifest destiny” it proclaimed. Of course, the only territorial “destiny” that is truly “manifest” is the divine one that bestowed the land of Israel on the people of Israel. And the Euphrates border? Consider that a Messianic vision – except, perhaps, if our neighbors to the east attack us and are defeated.

Carlson was also bewildered by the grant of land to the descendants of Avraham. How can they be defined? He even called for a DNA test, which Huckabee parried by saying that such would exclude righteous converts. He could have added that the Torah prescribes that only descendants of Avraham through Yitzchak share our covenantal mission and rights to the land of Israel (Breisheet 21:12, Nedarim 31a), by implication excluding descendants of Yishmael and Esav.

Asked to prove that Netanyahu is a Jew who shares in the covenant, Huckabee appropriately cited the Mesorah, and movingly portrayed the Jewish connection to the land of Israel through unending residence here, even after the destruction of the Temple; that we face Jerusalem in prayer wherever we are in the world (consider: Muslims praying in Israel literally turn their backs on Jerusalem and face Mecca); our adherence to the Torah and the Hebrew language; and our embrace of the covenant. Carlson was unmoved, if he was even listening.

Thus the Right of Return – vilified by Carlson – assures that the Jewish nation-state can survive.  That vexes Carlson, who is untroubled by even more restrictive citizenship criteria in Japan, the Emirates, or his patron Qatar, all US allies, where the average immigrant can never become a citizen no matter how long they live there and even if they are born there. And Carlson fully embraces the classic lie – popularized but not invented by the Nazis – that we Jews are not the descendants of the real Jews of antiquity but imposters. Apparently, according to Carlson, Israel does not have the right to exist as a Jewish state because Jews simply do not exist.

Carlson was particularly angered by Huckabee’s meeting Jonathan Pollard, even terming him the “most dangerous spy in American history.” Really? Worse than Benedict Arnold? He uttered this bit of ignorance with an abundance of confidence, willfully unaware that Pollard was accused of spying for the Soviet Union by Aldrich Ames, to deflect attention from the person who was actually spying for the Soviet Union, whose name happened to be Aldrich Ames, who died last month after serving 32 years in prison.

Carlson also seemed blissfully unaware of the true nature of American aid to Israel. As the ambassador correctly pointed out, all of this money is spent in America and subsidizes the US arms industry. Furthermore, the US return on this investment is more than tenfold annually, in terms of intelligence Israel provides and the promotion of US interests in the region and beyond. He could have added that the US has spent far more money maintaining bases in Germany and Japan eighty years after World War II, as well as provided Ukraine just in the last few years, than it has ever granted Israel. He clearly believes that any foreign aid is wasted money that should be spent in the US. That is a plausible but unconvincing argument, akin to claiming that his advertisers waste money because I will never patronize their products, so why are they paying him. But others will, and so advertisers assume there will be a return on their investment. The same principle applies to foreign aid to Israel, if not other countries.

Perhaps the most egregious and outrageous of Carlson’s ramblings is his moral equivalence  between Hamas and Israel. True, he admittedly hates Hamas, but without admitting it, he hates Israel as well. Hamas slaughters people and Israel slaughters people. Huckabee tried to explain the difference between the assailant and the assaulted, the victimizer and the victim, but unsuccessfully, no fault of the ambassador’s. Carlson pronounced himself, as a Christian, opposed to all wars and violence. Really? Even the Revolutionary War? The Civil War? World War II? Does he not subscribe to the “just war” doctrine of the Christians, or is he an absolutist, a pacifist, who is intolerant of any violence at all?

In any event, Carlson’s abhorrence of violence, “as a Christian,” sounds tone-deaf to Jews considering our history as victims of anti-Jewish Christian violence, forced conversions, blood libels, and the like. The good news is that Jews and Christians have mostly reconciled in the last few decades; the bad news is that Carlson seems intent on reviving the classic Christian religious-based hatred of Jews.

In truth, I haven’t paid much attention to him in years but was urged to watch this interview. Carlson’s manner was maddening. He was tactless, argumentative, frenetic, manic, ignorant, quick to distort Huckabee’s words and repeatedly so, and unable to answer any of Huckabee’s questions.  He presents as a tad disturbed.

I did learn two things. Mike Huckabee has exquisite patience and must have been a fine pastor. And Qatar Carlson, I mean Tucker Carlson, should be barred from future visits to Israel as a peddler of Nazi and radical Muslim ideology, an enemy of Jews and Israel, and – it will shortly become clear – the United States as well.

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Seeds of Failure

Posted on January 29, 2026 | Comments Off on Seeds of Failure

(First published at Israelnationalnews.com)

The return of Ran Gvili H”YD for burial in Israel is a source of great relief and catharsis for all Jews. His personal story, heroism, and self-sacrifice are so compelling that it could easily epitomize the courage and resilience exhibited by our entire nation during this difficult period. For the first time in several decades, no Jew is being held hostage in Gaza or Lebanon, an achievement it itself, and something our enemies know quite well. His return fulfills one of the three war objectives set forth by PM Netanyahu who deserves enormous credit for clinging steadfastly to this one despite intense pressure to settle.

Ran’s repatriation should also remind us of the sheer cruelty of our enemy – brutal mass murderers and revolting ghouls, who torture, maim, and murder, and then callously retain the bodies of the deceased. That enemy might have been ravaged but it has not yet been defeated – and the pathway towards achieving the other war aims – disarming and dismantling Hamas – are strewn with obstacles and dangers, often born of the naïveté with which some of our interlocutors perceive our enemies. One pathway is staring right at us.

The odds of President Trump’s Board of Peace succeeding are less than the odds of Greenland becoming the 52nd state of the United States (after Canada becomes the 51st). It is not only because it is a vanity project that will not survive beyond Trump’s presidency and will likely dissipate long before then accompanied by the fanfare of the numerous synthetic successes it has achieved. The Board of Peace will fail because it possesses little understanding of the dynamics of the Middle East – and much of the rest of the world – and is comprised of enough rogue nations that it already has sown the seeds of its own collapse.

It is undeniable that the Board of Peace fills the vacuum caused by Israel’s failure to articulate a vision for Gaza beyond generalities and, worse, Israel’s reluctance to do what is necessary to ensure that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel’s security or existence, i.e., sovereignty, resettlement of Gazans who wish to leave, and settlement of Jews who wish to live there. This disinclination to utterly transform the Gazan part of the conflict guarantees that the recent war was just another round and sometime in the future we will be forced to again fight the same people and their heirs over the same territory and its latest occupiers.

Indeed, the Board of Peace is almost designed to ensure that the conflict will persist. The mere fact that countries such as Qatar and Turkey, enemies of Israel and funders and protectors of Hamas, are part of the Board is a macabre joke at our expense. Steve Witkoff, perhaps others on his team, if not bought and paid for by Qatar, are at least rented by them. He seems unconcerned about the true nature of Qatar but his nocturnal dreams of peace and prosperity are our living nightmare.

The Gaza Board is another farce, filled with assorted Jew haters, scoundrels, reprobates, and a few good men, all assembled on the risible notion that a Gaza with the same Jew-hating, genocidal citizenry can be remade into luxury resort to which vacationers will flock. This will happen shortly after the unnamed nations that have promised billions of dollars for Gazan reconstruction pony up. Any day now. Perhaps an impressive show of confidence would be if the Americans moved their Gaza supervision base from Kiryat Gat in Israel to… Gaza itself, where, if anywhere, it belongs.

A good start for Israel would be drawing a red line against the introduction of any troops from Qatar, Turkey, Russia and other nations whose interests are inimical to ours and then dismissing any practical suggestions from those countries because they are invariably intended to weaken us, preserve Hamas, and prolong the conflict. Already, despite our government’s protestations to the contrary, elements of the Palestinian Authority were granted influence over Gaza’s direction and future. Whatever the spin, that mocks the sacrifices of our soldiers who would have fought, seemingly, to restore Gaza to PA, and ultimately Hamas, control.

Perhaps the time has come to state the obvious, something that the nations of the world have to tap dance around out of fear and intimidation. Assuming that President Trump cannot impose tariffs on me, it bears declaring the following. If all that Trump did was free the remaining hostages we would have said Dayenu, it would have been enough. It is to his eternal credit. But he has done so much more – recognizing Yerushalayim as our capital city, moving the embassy there, recognizing the Golan, declaring that Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria do not violate international law, resupplying Israel as soon as he took office, bombing the Iranian reactors, providing diplomatic coverage at the UN, etc. Dayenu, indeed.

Nevertheless, President Trump is a showman, an entertainer, whose blustery rhetoric often has little connection to reality. No, Mr. President, Israel created the Iron Dome, not the United States; no, you have not settled eight wars (or nine, if you count that Trump averted the almost war between the US and Denmark); no, you didn’t free all the hostages (almost 200, living and murdered, were freed before you became president); no, the United States is not the “hottest” country in the world (its economic engine is being fueled by trillions of dollars of deficit spending that has devastated the dollar’s value and cannot be repaid); no, you didn’t win by a “landslide” in 2024, 2020, or 2016 (in two elections, you squeaked out a victory by barely winning several states, and in 2020, your opponent similarly squeaked out a victory by barely winning several states, or so the evidence indicates); and the $18 trillion in foreign investment about which you boasted has not arrived and likely never will. In a world governed by appearances, not reality, other countries can play that game as well.

In the most recent and egregious example of careless magniloquence, Trump promised Iranians rebelling against their corrupt and brutal government that “help was on the way” and Iran will be “hit very strong” if the Iranian regime starts massacring its citizens. Well, in exchange for empty promises from Iran not to publicly hang eight hundred dissidents – who made such a promise is unknown – those eight hundred dissidents were not publicly hanged but reportedly privately shot. The Iranian civilian death toll has surpassed 30,000 people and is likely far more than that, and help is still not on the way.

Anyone who thinks that President Trump will endanger American lives in order to overthrow the Iranian regime is dreaming. If anything, he will take the safest, more risk-free approach, bombing targets from the air which is unlikely to topple the Ayatollah. And even if the Ayatollah’s rule collapses because of air attacks accompanied by the most important element of a rebellion – the Iranian military turns on its rulers – the likelihood is that Trump will be quite content to have one dictator (the Ayatollah) replaced by another dictator (some Iranian general) who professes however cagily his support for Trump and America, just as the thug, mass murdering Ahmed al-Sharaa has done in Syria (massacring Kurds while retaining US support and funding).

This would be identical to what happened in Venezuela, where dictator Maduro was captured and imprisoned by the US, only to be exchanged for another dictator, Delcy Rodriguez, who still torments her people but has now pledged allegiance to the US. I cannot help but wonder if Trump rejected the overtures of María Corina Machado, the popular opposition leader, because (in his mind) she won his Nobel Peace Prize. That would be petty, would it not? And how will Trump respond if the Nobel Committee awards this year’s Peace Prize to Steve Witkoff? We may well find out.

But Conchado certainly has more support in Venezuela than does the Shah’s son and heir-to-the-throne in Iran. Regime change in Iran that swaps one hater of Israel in a turban with another hater of Israel in a military beret does not help us that much, nor will that new leader’s promises about Iran’s nuclear ambitions count for much in the real world. Those promises, though, will play well in the ersatz world of proclamations, declarations, signing ceremonies, and assertions that peace, love, and eternal sunshine have broken out across the globe.

Israel has to be grateful to President Trump but also assertive about protecting our interests. There is a short window of opportunity, as Trump is likely to be severely weakened as president after the midterm elections this fall. And Trump’s successor – whether Democrat or Republican – is extremely unlikely to be as viscerally supportive of Israel as is Trump, even if it is sometimes just on the surface and not as much behind closed doors. No conceivable Democratic candidate will be as unabashedly pro-Israel and the Republican party is showing increasing signs of fracture on this issue as well.

Moreover, it is good to remind ourselves even outside of the daily prayers that we are “not to trust in princes, in a human being who has no salvation” (Tehillim 146:3). For, as the medieval commentator Radak notes, “if not for G-d’s will, no human has the power to save another from his troubles. Only G-d saves.” The real G-d, not the pretenders who claim divine powers.

Well, the Lord has blessed our generation with multiple opportunities to conquer, possess, and settle the land that He promised our forefathers. We have seized some of those opportunities but largely squandered many others, consistently surrendering to our enemies the territory from which they attacked us, hoping for a better outcome, rather than just enjoying the bounty that G-d granted us and building thereon a country worthy of our destiny.

Politicians who do not perceive that have outlived their usefulness. Those who do should receive the support of a grateful and faithful nation. And such truly honors the sacrifices of all our heroines and heroes, including Ran Gvili HY”D.

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