When I returned to my civilian job in the fall of 2003, following a tour in Iraq, everyone at my firm was so nice and gracious, thanking me for my service, pumping me for cool stories, and asking how my family had held up during my absence.
Given the length of time I was away (I’d spent a total of 18 months on active duty since 9/11), my bosses and I agreed that it might be a good idea for me to sit in with the incoming training class. And so I did, and it was time well spent, allowing me to refamiliarize myself with the firm and its products and procedures.
Now, while I mentioned how warmly I'd been welcomed back by "everyone," I may have overstated that by one.
There was one particularly senior partner at the firm who was neither liked nor respected by most of the rest. Unfortunately, he was deeply entrenched in his position in charge of the retail sales force which, alas, included me. He was also —let's just say— not a big fan of the military, a fact of which I was painfully aware. Nonetheless, given his role at the firm, I afforded him due respect and deference, even as he frequently made patronizing comments about my "little adventure" in Iraq. Unfortunately, even my best efforts at placating him were to little avail. The fact of the matter is that the former hippie had it out for me.
One day after lunch, he led what he'd advertised as an open, no-holds-barred rap session, where he'd lob a topic or question at the group and encouraged us to respond genuinely and honestly, with no filters.
At one point during the session, he threw out something to do with how our views of society had evolved throughout our lives. After a few others had weighed in, he turned to me and asked, "What about you, Brian? How would describe your evolving views of society?"
I may have hesitated as I began, but then offered, "Well, I think that when I was younger, I imagined that there was a sort of baseline for the intelligence of others — you know, society in general. And, while I can't say that I was aware of it as I matured and as my views were evolving, I've started to realize that the baseline is actually much lower than I'd once thought."
He was (actually, he pretended to be) flabbergasted.
"Are you saying that most people are stupid?" he demanded.
"No, not at all," I nervously replied. "That's not what I said, or meant"
It went back and forth for a bit, but I quickly realized where he wanted the conversation to lead, and that was with me in the HR department, picking up my last paycheck.
He really did, I’m not exaggerating.
Look, I know that I was a tough-guy Marine officer who'd just returned from a combat zone, and all that, but I had a pregnant wife and two young kids at home, so I was in no position to die on that particular hill that day.
So, while tempted to call him out for his having cynically touted the session format in a "hold nothing back" manner, I instead apologized profusely for my blatant insensitivity and poor choice of words.
Fast forward 20 years, as nincompoops the world over march through cities and across campuses, regurgitating Hamas propaganda, calling on, and actually demanding Israel agree to a ceasefire, and my "baseline" of human intelligence has hit an entirely new low. And, along with it, my general view of human empathy, decency, and basic common sense.
Around the globe on Saturday, tens of thousands of dimwits —including many Jews, mind you—participated in rallies and protests, calling for an end to Israel’s “genocide,” its “siege” of Gaza, and its “occupation” of Palestine. At protests in cities as far-flung as London, New York, Washington, Paris, Berlin, Bucharest, and Milan, marchers carried signs describing Israel as a racist and apartheid state and even —if you can believe it—comparing Jews to Nazis.
Members of Capitol Hill’s socialist Squad continue to openly question a democratic nation’s right to self-defense and disparage the pro-Israel community. President Biden’s political team frets that his commitment to Israel might cost him votes in states like Michigan, and it seems that the Commander-in-Chief might be starting to buckle under the pressure.
At a fundraising event in Minnesota last Wednesday, Biden was speaking to a crowd of about 200 when some lunatic woman in the audience —who turned out to be a rabbi, for goodness sake— shouted, “Mr. President, if you care about Jewish people, as a rabbi, I need you to call for a ceasefire right now,”
As most of the crowd immediately began to jeer the heckler, Rabbi Jessica Rosenberg, Biden could’ve just ignored the kook who, while being escorted from the event by security staff, repeatedly sang, “ceasefire now” on her way to the back door. Or, he could have reminded the good rabbi of the atrocities committed by Hamas just weeks ago. He might also have pointed out that her fellow Jews in Israel currently find themselves in an existential clash against the forces of evil, and that the US would continue to stand with its ally during its current struggle.
Instead, he responded, “I think we need a pause. A pause means give time to get the prisoners out.”
So weak.
What, Mr. President, is a “pause” but a temporary ceasefire?
First of all (I could begin with countless "first-of-alls" here), do any of these simpletons truly believe that Hamas will agree to, and actually honor, any ceasefire agreement? Are they not yet familiar enough with what this group is capable of doing, and of ignoring?
Yes, ignoring, as they proved on October 7, when they ignored the "ceasefire" that was in effect, and launched Operation Al-Aqsa Flood (their euphemistically misleading appellation for their merciless slaughter of civilians). Maybe you didn't know about that ceasefire. It would be easy to miss, given the barbaric acts the group carried out very much in spite of it.
Anyone requiring additional evidence of how Hamas views such arrangements is clearly part of the problem.
Have the wankers chanting “Free Free Palestine” not seen the footage from October 7? Do they not recall what evils Hamas wrought that day? How they killed, tortured, raped, beheaded, and abducted innocent Israeli civilians? Did you hear about the babies in ovens? Or the pregnant mother whose abdomen was cut open in front of her two young children?
Yeah, that's exactly how they'll abide by a new ceasefire, dummies.
At this point, the announcement of a ceasefire will serve as a muezzin call to the world that behavior once considered incomprehensible is now an appropriate and effective means of leverage and, as such, should be employed whenever necessary. When Prime Minister Netanyahu tells the world that he just ain’t gonna budge about all the ceasefire nonsense, we should be gratefully praising him for protecting the rest of humanity from willingly and stupidly redefining the very rules of civilization.
And why didn't I hear anyone crying for a ceasefire at any point on October 7? Why was no one protesting in the Capitol Rotunda, or on the East Side of Manhattan as barbarians murdered more than 1,400 innocent Israeli civilians, including babies in their cribs, children in front of their parents, and parents in front of their children?
Why no calls for a ceasefire as 3,000 Hamas sadists burned entire families to death; deliberately targeted elementary schools; paraded the naked body of a battered woman through the streets like a trophy; and decapitated and mutilated their victims? Or why wasn't anyone demanding a ceasefire when the savages executed a grandmother in her home and then uploaded the snuff film to the woman's Facebook page?
Yeah, I think that might’ve been an appropriate day to be calling for a ceasefire.
And remember, the terms of any ceasefire need to be abided by both sides (more on that in a bit), and Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah haven’t so much as taken a breather in their assaults on Israeli targets. Last Wednesday evening, Hamas' Al Qassam Brigades, operating in northern Gaza, launched 12 rockets into the Israeli city of Kiryat Shmona, killing four and wounding two. I wonder if the morons calling for a ceasefire pay any attention to Israeli casualties.
On Saturday, as part of its ongoing effort to encourage civilians to depart Gaza City —where Hamas forces and resources are concentrated— the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) announced a three-hour safe passage arrangement. A spokesman said that the IDF would enable Palestinians to move south along Salah al-Din Road between 1 p.m. and 4 p.m..
Had they cared for the welfare of their fellow Palestinians, the Hamas fiends in the vicinity might have chosen not to impede the procession of civilians away from legitimate military targets. Instead, as Israeli soldiers worked to open the road and escort civilians to safety, the scoundrels fired on them with mortars and guided anti-tank missiles.
That evening, Hezbollah carried out simultaneous attacks on positions in northern Israel, bragging about its employment of a new, more powerful missile that it hadn’t previously employed.
To Accomplish What?
Take any of these delusional and duplicitous dingbats at their word, and they'd have you believe that the purpose of a ceasefire would be to protect innocent Palestinian lives, rather than to provide Hamas and its accomplices an opportunity to regroup and rearm, as well as to deprive Israel of the critical strategic advantage of initiative.
If any of these peabrains try to convince you that Hamas wants a ceasefire for the sake of Palestinian civilians, respond as follows:
Moreover, any call for a ceasefire completely overlooks the fact that Hamas' 1988 charter not only calls for the complete annihilation of Israel and the extermination of Jews but also flat-out rejects the very notion of such treaties and agreements.
Don't believe me? Okay, here are a few snippets:
The Day of Judgement will not come about until Muslims fight the Jews (killing the Jews). When the Jew will hide behind stones and trees, the stones and trees will say ‘O Muslims, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.’ Only the Gharkad tree would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews. (Weird.)
Palestine is consecrated for future Muslim generations until Judgement Day. No part of it should not be squandered [or] be given up.
Nothing in nationalism is more significant than when an enemy should tread on Muslim land. Resisting and quelling the enemy becomes the individual duty of every Muslim, male or female.
Initiatives, so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences, are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement…These conferences are only ways of setting the infidels in the land of the Muslims as arbitrators.
In the face of the Jews' usurpation of Palestine, it is compulsory that the banner of Jihad be raised.
There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through Jihad.
It’s very important to remember that when they use the word Palestine, they’re talking about all of it, the full monty and whole shebang, kitchen sink included. That’s what they mean when you hear them chant, “From the river to the sea!”
Do any of the clueless bozos who get their rocks off by mindlessly protesting truly believe that a ceasefire is going to convince Hamas to amend or ignore its founding document? Of course not, but even if they did, Hamas isn’t the only party with whom a ceasefire would need to be worked out.
To paraphrase a passage from William Shirer’s book, “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich:” Not every German who bought a copy of Mein Kampf went to the trouble of actually reading it. If more of them —as well as the statesmen of the world— had perused it before 1933, Germany and the world might have been saved from catastrophe.
When a terrorist (or a Nazi) tells you his intent, believe him. Especially when he puts it in writing.
A Ceasefire with Whom?
On October 25, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah met with the Secretary-General of Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), Ziad Nakhaleh, and Salih al-Aruri, Deputy Chairman of Hamas. According to a statement released after the meeting, the three members of the "Axis of Resistance" discussed "what the axis must do at this critical stage to achieve real victory…in Gaza and Palestine and to stop Israel's brutal aggression."
Last Wednesday, Nasrallah reported that his terrorist militia —the largest non-state military force in the world— is already engaged in unprecedented fighting near the Lebanese border with Israel, and that the group is prepared for all options, saying, "We can resort to them at any time."
Then, in a televised speech on Friday, Nasrallah told viewers, “We have been engaged in this battle since October 8.”
He added, “What is happening now along the Israeli-Lebanese border is significant, and it is not the end.”
Hezbollah’s military resources include over 100,000 soldiers; about 150,000 rockets and missiles; as well as anti-air, anti-ship, and anti-armor systems. It also receives roughly a billion dollars in annual funding, 70% of which comes directly from Iran.
Since the outbreak of the current conflict, Hezbollah has conducted daily assaults on northern Israel, killing (as of this writing) six Israeli soldiers and one civilian. In his speech, Nasrallah boasted that the ongoing attacks had drawn Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) resources away from the fight with Hamas.
“Our operations on the border have forced the IDF to divert forces, weapons and equipment from Gaza and the West Bank to the Lebanese front,” he gloated. “One-third of the IDF is now amassed on our border.”
So, numbskulls, with whom should that slice of the ceasefire be negotiated? With Nasrallah himself, his Lebanese hosts, or his Iranian sponsors?
We now also know more about how deeply involved the Islamic Republic of Iran was in the years-long preparation for the heinous Oct 7 slaughter. In September, about 500 militants from Hamas and PIJ were trained, in Iran, by officers of the Quds Force, the foreign-operations branch of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). In fact, Quds leader, Gen. Esmail Qaani, supervised the whole exercise.
We've learned that the 31 drone and missile strikes that have targeted American troops in Syria and Iraq over the last few weeks were launched by Iran’s proxies. Pentagon spokesman BGen Paul Ryder confirmed as much last Wednesday, when he told reporters, "We know that these are Iranian-backed militia groups that are supported by Iran, and, of course, we hold Iran responsible for these groups."
Just a few days ago, Hamas’ leader, the thoroughbred hypocrite Ismael Haniyeh left his cushy accommodations in Qatar, boarded his private jet, and traveled to Tehran, where he met with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
On Saturday, after returning to Qatar, Haniyeh met in Doha with Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian who pledged his nation’s continued support and cooperation in achieving the goals of Hamas and the Palestinian people.
Does it sound to you like anyone in Iran is itching to sign onto a ceasefire agreement with Israel any time soon?
On October 19, the Navy destroyer USS Carney shot down four projectiles bound for Israel. Saudi Arabia later shot down a fifth.
The following week, an errant missile or drone damaged a building in Taba, Egypt and another fell in the vicinity of the nearby city of Nuweiba.
While each of those ill-fated missions was intended for Israel, none of them originated from Palestinian or Lebanese territory. Rather, they were fired by Yemen's Houthi rebels, the Iran-backed Shia militia that, on October 31 declared that such attacks would continue "to help the Palestinians to victory."
Last Tuesday, Houthi spokesman Yahya Sare’e confirmed that his forces had launched another “barrage of ballistic and cruise missiles and numerous drones on various Israeli positions in the occupied territories”.
Sare’e added that such attacks will continue “until the Israeli aggression stops.”
Mohammad al Bukahaiti, a member of the political bureau of the Houthis (whose official name is Ansar Allah or, Supporters of Allah) said last week that, “when we heard about the United States’ decision to bring its fleets near Yemen, we felt happy because we will be able to strike them”
Also worth pointing out is that the Houthi slogan reads, "Allah is the greatest, Death to America, Death to Israel, Curse on the Jews, Victory to Islam"
That has a catchy ring to it, don’t you think?
In an interview last Monday, Ishtan Ataya, a high-ranking official of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), began by slinging the old BS story that the objective of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood was to "prevent the targeting of Al-Aqsa Mosque (in Jerusalem), disparaging or insulting of Muslim religious sites, assault of our women, efforts to Judaize Al-Aqsa Mosque and normalize Israeli occupation of it."
Not a syllable of his frivolous assertion has any basis in fact.
(I told you in a recent piece about how the completely fabricated al-Aqsa Mosque ruse has been around since Haj Amin al-Husseini created it out of thin air, back in the 1920s. Well, a century later, it appears the PIJ hasn’t yet grown bored of it.)
In a Saturday interview with Beirut’s Al-Mayadeen TV network, PIJ spokesman, Musab al-Brim referred to the United States as an enemy that kills children with its weapons, and stressed that the “forces of resistance” have their sites set on both Israel and the US.
Now, while PIJ forces have been fighting alongside their Hamas allies, they fall under an entirely separate leadership structure which, presumably, would also expect a seat at the negotiating table. Right?
Just wondering.
And if all that ain’t enough, how about the fact that the Russian paramilitary Wagner Group has announced its intention to supply Hezbollah with state-of-the-art air defense assets?
Yeah, remember those guys? They're the ones who, back in June, actually came (at least kinda) close to toppling Vladimir Putin.
The mercenary militia is now led by 25-year-old Pavel Prigozhin, son of the group’s recently assassinated founder, Yevgeny Prigozhin.
The younger Prigozhin has pledged to supply Hezbollah with Russian Pantsir-S1 “Greyhound” guided anti-aircraft systems, giving the terrorist army advanced capabilities to repel Israeli aircraft, cruise missiles, and precision munitions.
At the Pentagon, BGen Pat Ryder called the news “very concerning'.”
Are we maybe starting to run out of room at the ceasefire table?
Okay, but what does Hamas think about the idea of a ceasefire?
Well, what do you say we ask them?
In his October 24 interview with Al-Mayadeen, Ghazi Hamad, a senior member of Hamas’ politburo made the groups views on the subject (and beyond) pretty clear.
“Israel is a country that has no place on our land,” Hamad said. “We must remove it because it constitutes a security, military and political catastrophe to the Arab and Islamic nation. We are not ashamed to say this.”
He called Israel’s existence “illogical” and insisted that it must be wiped off all “Palestinian lands.”
When the interviewer asked him if that meant the complete annihilation of Israel, Hamad replied, “Yes, of course.”
“We must teach Israel a lesson, and we will do it twice and three times. The Al-Aqsa Flood is just the first time, and there will be a second, a third, a fourth.”
Yeah, that dude is gonna honor a ceasefire.
UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly posted Hamad’s interview to X last Wednesday, asking, as any reasonable person might, “How can there be peace when Hamas are committed to the eradication of Israel? This is an official from Hamas committing to repeat the atrocities from 07/10 again and again.”
Or we might pay attention to what a captured Hamas terrorist conveyed to Israel's Shin Bet internal security department. In a video released last Wednesday, Omar Sami Marzuk Abu Rusha, a member of Hamas’ Nukhba special forces, stoically informed his interrogators that his unit had been assigned a remarkably straightforward task.
“The mission was simply to kill. We were not supposed to kidnap, only to kill,” he said. “To kill every person we see and come back.”
He was then gracious enough to offer his captors some highlights of his day at the Kfar Azza kibbutz:
"We moved in the first house. We checked it and there was nothing there. Hamzeh A-Zarad burned the exterior room, set it on fire. Then someone came out towards the garden in the back with a water hose - Abu Ahmed and Hamzeh saw him, shot at him and killed him."
"We went to the second house. We fired at the windows and broke all the glass…we didn't find any people inside. I set fire to the bedroom. I set it on fire.”
"We moved to the third house. There was a woman inside. Hamza killed her, he shot her…with a Kalashnikov.”
"Afterwards, we entered a house that was near us... We checked the house and heard the sounds of young children in the safe room…young children crying. We shot at the safe room…until we didn’t hear noise anymore.”
Yet another twisted reprobate who probably wouldn’t be all that inclined to honor a ceasefire.
Last month, the IDF released a recording of another Hamas terrorist, who actually telephoned his similarly depraved parents in order to boast to them about how many Jews he had killed in a southern Israeli kibbutz.
"Hi dad, I'm talking to you from Mefalsim. Open my WhatsApp now, and you'll see all those killed. Look how many I killed with my own hands! Your son killed Jews," the terrorist gloated.
"Allahu akbar," his father replied.
"Dad, I'm talking to you from a Jewish woman's phone. I killed her, and I killed her husband. I killed 10 with my own hands!"
Throughout the call with his son, the father repeatedly, "Allahu akbar.”
Hell, you should probably just listen for yourselves.
Ceasefires Don’t Work (particularly when homicidal animals are involved)
I mentioned earlier that there was actually a ceasefire in effect on October 7, so consider that Exhibit A.
According to Patrick Burke of Zurich’s Center for Security Studies, in 25 different wars since 1947, there have been 105 failed ceasefires, 84% of which led to a new offensive within an average of 13 days.
In February 2005 Hamas, PIJ and the Palestinian National Authority agreed to a ceasefire with Israel, and yet Palestinian suicide bombings continued at a pace similar to before the agreement.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak mediated a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas that went into effect on June 19, 2008. Within a week, Islamic Jihad was firing rockets into Israel from the West Bank, and six days after agreeing to the truce, Hamas fired three Qassam rockets from Gaza that struck the Israeli border town of Sderot.
Still, the tenuous pact remained “in effect” for the next five months, even as 19 rocket and 18 mortar attacks were launched from Gaza.
At 9:00 a.m. on the morning of November 21, 2012, after eight days of intense fighting, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu directed the IDF to begin its observance of another Egyptian-brokered ceasefire, and the Israeli Air Force (IAF) immediately ceased its strikes on Gaza.
Hamas, on the other hand, wasn’t yet ready to abide by the terms of the pact, instead firing more than 30 rockets into central and southern Israel that same day. While the Iron Dome anti-missile system was able to intercept most of the projectiles, an Israeli soldier was injured by shrapnel from the explosion of one of the rockets, and two landed in the coastal city of Ashkelon, causing fires. Hamas even bragged about having fired a Syrian-made rocket on the northern city of Haifa — on the very day the ceasefire was to go into effect.
Netanyahu quickly made clear that Israel would not restrain itself from responding forever. “We accepted the Egyptian ceasefire proposal to give an opportunity to demilitarize the Gaza Strip from rockets,” he said. “If Hamas continues to fire at Israel, Israel will have the international legitimacy to take action.”
And so it did. At just past noon that day, the IAF conducted a single, limited air strike in northern Gaza, with no injuries reported.
The ceasefire had lasted barely three hours.
Now, the sane and logical among you might have a hard time figuring out why, after 192 Gazans had been killed over the previous week and another 1,400 wounded, Hamas would defy the terms of the agreement. The group’s stated reason, at the time, was that they simply didn’t feel like they’d been sufficiently consulted during the negotiating process and that, according to Mkhaimar Abusada, of Gaza’s Azhar University, Hamas felt it “should get a much better deal in order to end the fighting.”
In 2014 alone, four different ceasefires were announced for Gaza, the most durable of which held for 20 days.
On July 7, in response to Hamas kidnapping seven Israeli teenagers in the West Bank, the IDF launched Operation Brother's Keeper in the Palestinian territory, arresting some 350 Hamas militants. Hamas countered by significantly increasing its rocket attacks on Israel, leading to one of the deadliest outbreaks of violence in decades. Over the ensuing seven weeks, Palestinian militants fired 4,564 rockets and mortars into Israel.
However, even amid the ongoing violence, another ceasefire was announced on the evening of July 29, 2014, with Egypt agreeing to include Hamas and PIJ in the discussions. The calm lasted for three weeks before three rockets fired from Gaza exploded outside of Be'er Sheva.
Then, on August 20, Hamas broke its own daily record of 154 rocket launches, firing 168 into several Israeli cities and towns.
Yet another ceasefire was announced on August 26 and didn’t last two weeks before Hamas fired a rocket into the Eshkol Regional Council, near southern Gaza.
So, yeah, in memory of those 1,400 Israeli civilians who were brutally slaughtered on October 7, trying another ceasefire sounds like a great idea!
They're Everywhere
As I imagine most of those who took to American streets to protest on Saturday didn’t vote for Donald Trump in 2016, maybe it would be worth their while to heed the counsel of the woman they likely hoped to elect that year, former Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, who was actually involved in negotiating the 2012 Gaza ceasefire. Last week, while speaking at Rice University, Clinton insisted, “People who are calling for a ceasefire now do not understand Hamas. It’s not possible.”
She continued, “It would be such a gift to Hamas because they would spend whatever time there was a ceasefire in effect rebuilding their armaments, creating stronger positions to be able to fend off an eventual assault by the Israelis.”
(I never woulda thought I’d be quoting Hillary in such a favorable light.)
I'm truly at a loss in trying to figure out where all of these simpletons are getting the information that’s spurring their asinine behavior. For all I know, it might be from Al Jazeera's Somdeep Sen, author of the book, "Decolonizing Palestine." The day following the Hamas attack Sen posted a piece to the network's website which claimed, "The Palestinian faction also sent its fighters from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel, where they attacked military targets, briefly took control of some Israeli settlements and took dozens of civilians and soldiers hostage.
Is it just me, or does it feel like he left out a bunch of stuff?
Or maybe they’re listening to guys like Osama Hamdan, a senior Hamas leader who recently sat for an interview with Australia’s 7 News, and claimed that the atrocities of October 7 were committed by Israeli soldiers.
But don’t take my word for it. Check it out for yourself.
I’m quite certain that Mr. Hamdan doesn’t believe a word that he said in that interview. And that’s a big part of the problem. You can call me insensitive and prejudiced, but the reality is that —to put it in the most tactful and inoffensive way possible— many in his culture simply do not view the act of expressing an untruth in the same negative way that we in the West do.
Sorry, but I’ve spent some time in the neighborhood and experienced it firsthand — even from “friendlies.”
Anyway, combine that tendency to prevaricate with a deep, bloodthirsty, and religiously inspired desire to exterminate an entire race, and you've got a wicked problem on your hands, one that will not be solved through negotiations and ceasefires.
The civilized world needs to recognize —like, yesterday— that what we're dealing with in Hamas, Hezbollah, PIJ, Ansar Allah, et al is an evil sub-species of homo sapiens that is decidedly less than fully human and is driven by a genocidal ideology. Its leaders and members cannot be afforded the same degree of respect and deference that we're conditioned to automatically grant our fellow human beings. This is a group that not only kills its enemies but relishes in their suffering. They snap photos and record videos of their terrified victims weeping, of rapes, beatings and slow beheadings, and post them to social media.
And, curiously, why have I not yet seen a single anti-Hamas demonstration.
Have you? Go ahead and Google it. Nope, only anti-Israel (i.e., anti-Semitic) protests. (I’ll get to that part later this week.)
So, rather than demand Hamas release the 239 hostages it currently holds in captivity, including 32 children, the parade of putzes continues to inexplicably demand that Israel spare the demonic perpetrators of the October 7 crimes against humanity.
Meanwhile, less than a week after the abomination it sponsored, the government of Iran organized a massive rally whose participants didn’t bother to hide behind the pretense of being “pro-Palestine.” Who’s got time for that? Remember, Shia Iranians don’t actually give a rat’s ass about the Sunni Palestinians of Gaza, the West Bank, or even Hamas.
They just want them to kill Jews.
Rather than waste their time voicing their support for the people of Gaza, the Iranian crowd let the world know their true feelings as they chanted, “Death to Israel. Death to Zionism!” As they marched, many carried the Palestinian flag while a similar number waved the flag of the terroristic Hezbollah.
To be clear, if Israel ceases, pauses, suspends (whatever) its military operations before having eliminated Hamas as a coherent threat, the region and the world will become a much more dangerous place.
This is not just Israel’s fight. Civilization requires nothing less than Israel's total victory and should be doing everything possible to ensure it.
Brian O'Leary is a retired Marine Corps colonel, who served for 30 years, including combat deployments to Somalia and Iraq, and command of an infantry battalion in Afghanistan. Additionally, he has spent 25 years in the financial services industry. Brian earned his BA in English from Penn State University and his MA in National Security Studies from the US Army War College.