Rabbi Pruzansky's Blog

(First published at Israelnationalnews.com)

The exuberance people feel at the release last week of American hostages held by Russia – Evan Gershkovich, Paul Whelan, and others – should be tempered by the price Western nations were forced to pay for them: the release of murderers, thieves, and spies. It underscores that the West has become utterly incapable of dealing with rogue nations – nations that evince contempt for fundamental moral norms, and not just international law – and that incapacity hampers Israel as well. It was not always like this.

Simply put, the United States indulged a state of affairs in which innocent civilians such as tourists, journalists, and dual citizens can just be grabbed off a Russian street, incarcerated in harsh conditions, tried under false pretenses, and blatantly used as pawns in order to free real bad actors. Such weakness only encourages more such hostage taking, whenever the need arises. The feeble response of the US was to protest, and when those protests were ineffective, to strongly protest, and when those also failed, to create hash tags, sign petitions, bask in their superior morality, protest some more, and then surrender to the Russian demands for an exchange of prisoners – the innocent for the guilty. Indeed, further hostage-taking is unnecessary, as Russia still holds twenty Americans, all to remain in prison until another exchange is warranted.

There was a time when arrests of Americans in Russia would be met with arrests of Russians in America. When diplomats or journalists of one country were expelled, the other country would then expel diplomats or journalists of its adversary. These days, the judicial system in democracies would not countenance arrest of an enemy’s innocent civilians (which does not preclude that from happening on foreign soil, with the acquiescence of a friendly government). As such, the playing field is uneven, and slanted in favor of the amoral countries. They have no limiting principle except expedience. They do what it takes to win or, at least, achieve their strategic objectives. Democracies are hamstrung by their commitment to quaint moral notions that, sadly, have little place in international relations.

This is one reason why the West never wins wars anymore. Victory is never the goal of any struggle; the goal is always de-escalation, and conflict avoidance at any cost. The fact that the US celebrated the return of these hostages – as Russia celebrated the return of their agents – proves the point. The goal was to release the hostages, period, despite the statement being broadcast to all about international norms and Western fragility. The US never even enacted a travel ban for its citizens to Russia, sanctions against Russia because of the Ukraine invasion have had little effect, and Russian citizens move freely throughout the West, unafraid of any repercussions.

In other words, the rogue nations – Russia, China, Iran – are winning, and there is little the West can do at this point to stop them, if there is not going to be a change in tactics. The rogue nations are the prime movers, they set the tone of international discourse, they control the lives and well-being of people far from their borders, and they pay almost no price for it. And the West just wants to give peace a chance, as the rogue nations spread their anarchy and mischief across the world.

Israel suffers from this as well, with the twist that we have for too long indulged the fiction of the “proxy” terrorist groups. Imagine if Israel created a “proxy” fighting force that had a free hand in dealing with the enemy as brutally as was deemed necessary, and then denied that it had any control over this force. Who would accept that?

It is bad enough that Iran wages war through surrogates and pays no price for it – its oil fields lie unmolested, generating billions of dollars of revenue, with Western submission to the relaxation of sanctions – as it attacks Israel and American assets in the Middle East. Far worse is the fiction propagated by American diplomacy that compelled Israel to distinguish between Hamas and Gaza – as if Hamas were not the elected rulers there – and between Hezbollah and Lebanon – as if Hezbollah is not the dominant component of the government there. The Hamas/Gaza distinction was accepted by Israel and greatly impeded the war effort; fortunately, the Hezbollah/Lebanon distinction has been rejected by Israel. What is still extant, and the prevailing theme in US diplomacy, is halting the fighting short of victory, de-escalation, an end to violence, all of which will just allow the bad actors to survive to massacre another day.

This surrender to rogue actors is part of the same pattern that produced the West-Russia hostage for prisoner exchange. And since democracies change governments much more frequently than do dictatorships when the deconfliction inevitably blows up, it is usually on someone else’s watch.

The Allies did not distinguish between Nazi Germany and German civilians, nor between Imperial Japan and Japanese civilians, which is why those enemy civilians were bombed to oblivion (this week marks 79 years since two atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki) and those rogue nations surrendered unconditionally. In the West, the will to win has dissipated; consequently, Israel’s stubborn insistence on victory – and survival – perplexes some and antagonizes others.

The inability to fight evil by all means necessary – I am not even referring to nuclear weapons, which have limited, practical value – is typified by Israel’s uncontrollable and unmanageable Supreme Court which has now taken on the cause of protecting the “rights” of the Hamas terrorists who murdered, raped, brutalized, and kidnapped, and still threaten to do it again. Our justices are unduly, and unseemly, concerned with the conditions of their incarceration. But count me among those who could not care less about the conditions of people who burned alive children, and so incinerated one Jewish woman that she was only identified this week as dead, ten months after being murdered.

These terrorists are not soldiers. Their targets were civilians. They do not deserve prisoner-of-war status. They do not deserve to be treated any better than our hostages are being treated and, indeed, they deserve to be treated worse – because our hostages are innocent, pure souls and they are guilty, contemptible, unfit even to be called human beings. They are not criminal to be incarcerated or soldiers to be exchanged at the end of the war. They are savages who have lost their right to live on this planet.

Similarly, it is a morally obscene that Israeli prosecutors are looking to indict IDF soldiers accused of maltreatment of a terrorist by that very terrorist. They must think that “this terrorist might rape and mutilate Jewish women but he would never even think of lying to frame the accused soldiers and demoralize others.” It is a legal system that has again failed us, does not represent or speak for the people, and should have been reformed years ago.

We hear constantly that our morality is our greatest strength, and we must maintain the moral high ground or we will “lose the world’s support.” The latter is risible, as our attempts to fight a “moral war” have earned us only international opprobrium, charges of war crimes, and indictment threats against our leaders and soldiers. It is the worst of all worlds – our self-restraint is harming our chances for victory and we are still vilified as international criminals. We have been foolishly providing food to our enemies – and nonetheless are still being accused of starving them. Bizarre, but not unexpected, as these are the tactics the enemy employs in its quest for victory and our demise.

Morality is undoubtedly a great strength, but not the modern Western moral notions that have seeped into our society. Our benighted justices and self-proclaimed moralists who sit in their ivory towers pondering the abstractions of “rights of enemy combatants” and “rights of enemy civilians” will only be pleased with stalemate, which means defeat. They are imbued with values that, in large measure, are alien to Jews. They assume that it is more moral to be a victim than to be a victor, not realizing that the greatest moral triumph is the defeat of evil and the forging of a better world.

Victory speaks for itself, and as the Allies did after World War II, they duly deliberated the morality and ramifications of their conduct. But they did it after World War II, not during, and they certainly did not afford their enemies the benefits of our morality that they had so brazenly mocked and callously breached. Morality that is not reciprocated is an albatross, a tool for defeat, and a gift to the rogue nations and terrorist groups.

The West is handcuffed by moral notions it fabricated and improvised (better, that its most liberal, progressive elements fabricated and improvised). Those bear little resemblance to the Torah’s ethic of warfare, which is absolute, designed to completely vanquish the enemy and win, and deter future attacks from our foes (see, for example, Chapter 6 of Rambam’s Laws of Kings and their Wars).

The West must learn to fight fire with fire, which will in short order quell the ardor of the rogue nations, wipe the gleeful smirks off their faces, and rein in their worst impulses. And we must learn that our enemies are not entitled to the benefits of Western morality, which they know is an effective weapon against us and the means to their survival. They are entitled to the Torah’s morality, which prioritizes our lives, physical and spiritual. And those who fear the effects on the Jewish soul during or after a war fought according to Torah norms, fret not. We should be confident that fidelity to Torah itself purifies and sensitizes.

Fighting a war on the enemy’s terms, pace, and morality is a recipe for defeat. The West does not realize that, and so its influence on world events is waning, its leaders are hapless, and evil is proliferating. We must realize that, and soon, take seriously that our enemies want to destroy us and will not be assuaged by soft words or a cease fire, and act accordingly. That is the Jewish ethic that should guide our leaders, and with the help of the Almighty, lead us to victory and redemption.

(First published at Israelnationalnews.com)

Prime Minister Netanyahu’s critics and haters are outraged that he is planning on visiting Washington DC next week and addressing Congress; then again, they are outraged when he wakes up every morning and when he goes to sleep at night. They claim that he is going for personal reasons, to improve his political standing, and to distract from his failures.

There are cogent reasons why he should go; nevertheless, it is a bad idea at an inopportune and will not yield any positives for Israel.

Certainly, there is a political benefit. Most Israelis will welcome the PM being cordially greeted by members of Congress. Pundits focus on the factoid that with his fourth speech before Congress, Netanyahu will exceed Winston Churchill’s record of the most congressional addresses ever delivered by one foreign leader, but who really cares about this record, aside from the pundit class? The average citizen does not care. There is an Israeli interest in shoring up Congressional support (that does not necessarily require a prime ministerial visit) and ensuring the steady provision of weapons already promised, contracted for, and voted on by Congress but which the Biden administration has admittedly slowed. Nevertheless, all this comes at a price.

The Netanyahu visit to Washington will attract the usual assortment of crazies, anti-Israel and anti-Jewish haters, some of them even claiming to be Jews. The media will duly report on the protests and give free publicity to the haters. Many Democrats in Congress will boycott Netanyahu’s speech, as they have done for the last two speeches, simply because they dislike him and his policies, and are less than supportive of Israel. How the oleaginous Chuck Schumer masks his contempt for Netanyahu behind his phony smiles would be intriguing to see, but it is not worth the trip. What is worse is that PM Netanyahu would fly to a United States that is a tinderbox, already on edge even before the assassination attempt on former President Trump.

In a polarized America, Israel has become another wedge issue, mainly dividing Democrats against themselves. But Netanyahu will be forced to parrot the old cliché that Israel enjoys bipartisan support, which is partly true and these days partly false. The Republicans overwhelmingly support Israel, in our war against Hamas, the conflict with Iran, and the Jewish national story. Democrats, by and large, do not, with Democratic congressional support for Israel far exceeding Israel’s support among the Democrat rank and file.

More egregiously, the White House meeting with Joe Biden does not bode well for Israel. Biden, in any event, is a spent force, barely functioning, desperately clinging to ever-diminishing moments of clear-headedness even as his party shows every sign of abandoning him as their nominee. Visiting Biden at this time is not just a bad look politically; it is almost an invitation to American pressure, which Netanyahu, defying his historic pattern, has mostly (though not completely) been able to deflect in the recent conflict. A visit now will almost guarantee a cease fire before Hamas is destroyed and a hostage deal that frees hundreds of terrorist murderers to again plague our cities and citizens. With Hamas near defeat, such a deal will only resuscitate this band of butchers and earn them plaudits from the Arab street instead of the ignominy they deserve. It will snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

But perhaps the most troubling aspect of a Netanyahu visit now involves necessarily wading into the volatile American presidential campaign. Consider that in his planned Congressional address, Netanyahu will have to thank Biden for his assistance, make an obligatory mention of his trip to Israel at the start of the war, and downplay Biden’s insults, heavy handedness, criticism of Israel’s conduct of the war, and the shenanigans with the weapons deliveries.

It should be obvious to all that any praise of Biden will offend Donald Trump, who has repeatedly criticized Biden for his tepid support of Israel, even blaming Biden’s weakness and disrespect on the international scene for Hamas’ attack. Praising Biden – which is the polite thing to do – undercuts an important part of Trump’s appeal to Jews. If nothing else, Trump has a long memory and will not forget this. And it also emboldens Biden in his attacks on Israel as Netanyahu’s tribute will give Biden cover for future recriminations. What benefit is there to Israel for Netanyahu to sit with Biden to hear about the panacea of the two-state delusion? Or for Netanyahu to listen to Biden opine for the umpteenth time that Iran will not acquire a nuclear weapon on Biden’s watch? None that I can see, and Biden has never ruled out Iran acquiring a nuclear weapon the day after his watch ends, which might even be in several weeks’ time. And to think that the US will take military action to thwart an Iranian bomb is a fool’s errand, and we have been down that rabbit hole for well over a decade.

Conversely, Netanyahu should (and would) praise Trump for all he did for Israel as president – moving the embassy to Jerusalem and formally recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, recognizing Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, and negotiating the Abraham Accords which transformed the Middle East in ways that were unimaginable pre-Trump. But Netanyahu’s celebration of Trump’s support for Israel will enrage Biden. Trump has been outspoken that Israel should “finish the job,” meaning defeat Hamas, whatever it takes; Israel would never hear Trump grumbling about loss of enemy civilian life, for which concern Israel has paid a heavy price in dead soldiers and prolonged the war.

Indeed, saying anything nice about either person infuriates half of the American populace. Is there a way to thread the needle – to say something that will be perceived as gracious to both men without offending either man or his supporters? I don’t see how.

It is a mistake to go now. Nothing will be gained and much can be lost. If the point is to demonstrate that the United States-Israel relationship is strong, that sounds great but is unnecessary. If it were that strong, it would neither need constant stroking nor an untimely visit.

Perhaps the turmoil in the United States will force a postponement. It should be inconceivable that Netanyahu visit the US and not meet with Donald Trump. As I recall, during Biden’s visit to Israel, he did meet with Israel’s opposition leaders. But in the current environment, such would not be appreciated by Biden, as a snub would not be appreciated by Trump.

It is a maelstrom in the United States. Mr. Prime Minister, don’t go. Wait until after the US elections. Otherwise, there is a greater possibility that relations will be harmed than that they will be improved. Maintain the tie with Churchill another few months and visit DC when Israel can gain tangible strategic benefits from an address to Congress and a pop-in at the White House.

It is undoubtedly true that “an eternal people are not afraid of a long journey,” but the moral flabbiness of the West does infiltrate the psyche of many Israelis as well. We do not seek war nor do we glorify war but “war fatigue” is a real phenomenon. In the West, people grow tired of war because generally their material lives are satisfying and they would rather indulge their physical desires than fight for abstract values. In Israel, there is weariness because of the persistent loss of young life, because life here is also blessed, and because – let’s face it – there is a lack of confidence that the security situation will markedly change if and when this round of hostilities ends.

To our detriment, many people entrusted with our security have long stopped speaking in terms of victory and their management of our wars reflects that resignation. Little effort is made to fundamentally change the security situation. That would entail a completely new reality, in which we no longer tolerate rockets and missiles fired at our cities and towns (whether or not they are intercepted by the Iron Dome) and, indeed, no longer even accept as normal the need for checkpoints to prevent terrorists from coming to murder us. That is not simple but it is manifestly doable as wars have traditionally been conducted before effete liberals imposed on the West rules of war that guarantee neither victory nor defeat and serve to embolden the barbarians to wage incessant war until their goals are achieved.

It is thus fair to ask: what are Israel’s objectives in this war and how close are we to attaining them? And what are Hamas’ objectives in this war and how close are they to attaining them? The answers are sobering.

Our government has repeatedly declared that Israel has three aims: the elimination of Hamas as a military and political force, the safe return of all our hostages and repatriation of the bodies of the murdered, and the preclusion of Gaza as a future threat to Israeli civilians.

To be sure, some of these goals are in the process of being achieved, even if the first two have always been somewhat incompatible. Our soldiers – with G-d’s grace and their extraordinary dedication, competence, and bravery – have dealt a severe blow to the enemy’s capabilities, although they have not yet finished the job. They have been hampered, and not for the first time, by a government that has vacillated under American pressure, and that has produced too many starts and stops to conduct an aggressive campaign to victory. The enemy has repeatedly been given the opportunity to regroup, has foolishly been supplied with assistance by our generosity, has for months (until recently) been allowed to replenish their weapons stockpiles through the Rafiach tunnel system, and has effectively used its “citizens,” few of whom are innocent, as “human shields” and won the hearts of many Westerners already ill-disposed to our existence.

More than one hundred innocent hostages have been freed in exchange for hundreds of bloodthirsty terrorists and eight have been freed in heroic rescue attempts. It is unknown how many hostages are still alive; their lives mean everything to us and less than nothing to Hamas except as pawns. It is likely true that, as trading pawns, Hamas values the lives of the hostages more than it values the lives of the Gazans who elected them to power.

The first two goals have been partly achieved but by no means has the mission been accomplished. Dozens of hostages still remain in harsh captivity and Hamas terrorists are still active. The third objective – foreclosing the possibility that Gaza will be a base of terror against Israel – is far from concluded. When occasional rockets are still launched from places that the IDF was supposed to control then we know that the enemy still lurks, still hates, and still lusts for our blood.

What are Hamas’ objectives, beyond its oft-stated goal of destroying Israel? Hamas also has three, perhaps four, objectives: murdering as many Jews as it can, using hostages in order to gain freedom for its imprisoned terrorists, and surviving. A fourth might be blackening Israel’s name across the world but that seems to be an aspiration that emerged from the conduct of the war rather than an objective in its original attack.

In achieving its goals, Hamas has, unfortunately, fared better than we like to think. It murdered more Jews in one day than at any time since the Holocaust and retains control over dozens of other Jews that it can brutalize and murder at will. It still has rocket and missile capabilities that can terrorize Israeli cities and make life complicated. Sad for the Jewish people and civilization itself, that is a Hamas success.

Hamas also survives and Israel has shortsightedly fostered the notion that defeat of Hamas in Gaza is tantamount to defeat of Hamas, period. That notion is false. Hamas today thrives in Jerusalem where it follows the same playbook it did to assert control over Gaza – dominating societal institutions such as mosques, welfare, education, employment, culture, sports, and the like, and then indoctrinating and radicalizing recipients of its largesse. In this endeavor, as in Gaza for years, it is subsidized openly by Qatar and Turkey. Hamas also dominates the Arabs of Judea and Samaria, one (good) reason why the Palestinian Authority has not held an election in twenty years. The PA correctly senses it will lose. And Hamas maintains its political base of power in countries around the world – and as is obvious from the violent anti-Israel and anti-Jewish protests in the United States and Europe, it is a burgeoning though surreptitious force there as well.

Furthermore, thus far, Hamas has gained the release of hundreds of its terrorists and will continue to up the ante and dangle our hostages as bait to free savage, barbaric murderers of Jews now imprisoned in Israel – to free them and again set them loose to try to murder more Jews. Israel has long failed to counter this diabolical strategy, achievable in two ways: first, executing convicted terrorist murderers (and attempted murderers) and, second, prohibiting the exchange of terrorists for hostages. Both concepts have been bandied about for years and legislation has been introduced but never enacted. Both would neutralize that tactic. Failure to authorize these measures has been gross negligence and has made us vulnerable to the hideous methods of the terrorists. The fear – expressed by some Israeli politicians for years – that the death penalty for terrorists would lead to harsh treatment for captive Jews is, in retrospect, tragically myopic.

Let it be said: a deal that frees vicious murderers of Jews even in exchange for our innocent hostages endangers even more Jewish lives down the road, and that road is not very long. It literally helps Hamas fulfill one of its primary war aims, renders it a hero in the Arab world, and will ensure its survival.

The unpleasant reality is that, at this point, Hamas seems closer to achieving its war aims than does Israel. It already murdered more than 1500 Jews, it has gained and plans to gain the release of its even more incarcerated terrorists, and since it hides among civilians, does not always wear uniforms, is not always identifiable, and has bases outside of Israel, it will likely survive as well, even in Gaza.

How can this trend be reversed? It doesn’t help to pummel more buildings or even destroy more tunnels, although such is obviously justifiable. Gaza already is filled with rubble. Defeat for Hamas – indeed, defeat in the Arab world generally – is defined as loss of territory. The stark reality is that the only way to ensure that Gaza is never again a base of terror against Israel is to depopulate Gaza. Its population is already radicalized. Sinwar can be killed tomorrow (we hope) and Gaza will remain radicalized. A new Sinwar will arise the day after. There is no shortage of homicidal maniacs to take his place. But the depopulation of Gaza – say, at first to Europe, which absorbed five million Syrian refugees in the last decade – will be perceived as a defeat for Hamas and its humiliation among the Arab populace. Add to that the resettlement of Gaza by Jews – and that is the picture of victory.

The truth is, anything else, even coming from our leaders, is empty spin and rhetoric. Plans to bring in the PA (G-d forbid), some assortment of friendly local Arabs, foreign entities, etc. are all nibbling at the edges and paving the way for the return of Hamas. Biden’s plan to rebuild Gaza from afar will inevitably rebuild all the tunnels and the terror infrastructure. Alternatively, resettlement of this hostile population also spares further harm to the “civilians” whose humanitarian interests are an overriding concern to the West, and apparently to Israel, despite the ubiquitous danger they pose to our well-being.

How that is to be done is of less import at this point that a consensus that this is the only decent, humanitarian way forward, the only approach that preserves Israel’s interests and even improves the plight of the Gazans. The question is, in this regard and in all matters relating to war, in the modern era: does the will to win exist? And the answer has far greater implications than we can imagine because the situation in the north and the homelessness of 80,000 Israelis should be intolerable to any self-respecting sovereign government.

The great American economist and social scientist Thomas Sowell once wrote that “if you are not prepared to use force to defend civilization, then be prepared to accept barbarism.” We have indulged barbarism far too long – bombs on buses and in markets, suicide bombers, stabbings and shootings, and now mass murder, rapes, torture, burning, dismemberment, and kidnapping.

The more we tiptoe around the reality of barbarism and shy away from confronting it with the full force that it deserves, the more we encourage it and the further we are from achieving our objectives in this war. Those who fantasize about accommodating barbarism were the originators, proponents, and administrators of the “conceptziyah” who brought upon us the failures of Oslo, the flight from Lebanon, the Gaza Expulsion, and the catastrophe of October 7.

The West is replete with politicians who, whatever they say publicly, are prepared to “accept barbarism” in exchange for the illusion of quiet, the temporary cease-fire. They are ones who are now clamoring for a cease-fire so that Hamas, not Israel, can achieve its war aims. They are afflicted with war fatigue because their primary interest is not our physical survival but their own political survival. An eternal people know better.

The Torah – the source of Jewish morality in its pure form, untainted by Western values – teaches us otherwise about the perennial war against evil, the conduct of such a war, our rights to the land of Israel, and the rights of the enemy population that seeks to murder us and strangle our national life. We should no longer settle for the half-measures of secular politicians that simply seek to push off the next debacle but seek workable solutions that remove these “pins in our eyes and thorns in our side” (Bamidbar 33:55).

The existing approach cannot achieve our declared war objectives. As such, that approach must and should change, and it is not too late to change it. All we need is the faith, spirit, and willpower to do it.