U.S. General: Hamas Leader Holed Up Deep Below Gaza, Surrounded by Israeli Hostages Used as Human Shields - Benjamin Weinthal (Fox News)
    Yahya Sinwar, the terrorist mastermind behind Hamas' massacre of nearly 1,200 people, including over 30 Americans, is believed to be using hostages as human shields to hold off Israeli soldiers seeking to capture him in a tunnel deep below Gaza, Gen. Jack Keane, former U.S. army vice chief of staff, told Sky News Australia on Thursday.
    "My sources tell me that Sinwar, who is the number one leader in Gaza of the Hamas organization, has 15-20 hostages protecting him and his family," Keane said.
    "That's why they have these hostages, to guarantee their survival. Israel is absolutely right in putting military pressure on them to force the release of the hostages."

A Bad U.S. Weapons Message to Israel - Editorial (Wall Street Journal)
    The Administration is squeezing Israel hard to abandon its plan to take Hamas' last Gaza stronghold in the city of Rafah.
    Axios reporter Barak Ravid said Sunday that the U.S. put a hold last week on a shipment of U.S.-made weapons to Israel.
    The fact that the U.S. didn't deny the report is telling. The Israelis view Ravid as the Biden Administration's preferred media conduit for its leaks about U.S. policy on the Israel and Gaza conflict.
    Israel's government can't end the war with Hamas' military brigades intact, and that means going into Rafah, as difficult as it may be.
    The U.S. should be putting pressure on Hamas to surrender and release the hostages.
    The more Hamas thinks it might be saved by U.S. pressure on Israel, the less likely Hamas is to agree to a ceasefire. That's a recipe for extending the war.
    Mr. Biden's strategy of pressuring Israel to make concessions that its government and citizens are united against hasn't worked. It hasn't won concessions from Hamas and its allies in Iran and Lebanon.
    Mr. Biden was in a stronger position, politically and strategically, when he spoke with moral clarity about Hamas and in support of Israel after Oct. 7.
    The fastest way to end the war is with an Israeli victory, and withholding weapons is exactly the wrong message to send an ally under siege.

Hamas' Strategy to Stymie Israeli Success at the Negotiating Table and the Battlefield - Irwin J. Mansdorf, PhD (Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs)
    Hamas' strategy is becoming clear: Play a "waiting game" where time is the variable that serves to their advantage. The more time that passes, the greater the pressure on Israel to refrain from military operations.
    By appearing to engage in serious negotiations, leaking various statements that purport to show their interest in a deal, and continuing to negotiate while not deciding, Hamas avoids being blamed for refusing to deal while simultaneously disrupting IDF strategy.
    In essence, Hamas is the party in control of the negotiations.
    With repeated public pronouncements by outside actors opposing Israeli action in Rafah, Hamas can take their time, believing that Israel will not act without the expressed consent of the U.S.
    The writer is a clinical psychologist and a fellow at the Jerusalem Center specializing in political psychology.

Revealed: Iran's Rapidly Expanding Secret Drone Factory Where Hizbullah Is Trained - Melanie Swan (Telegraph-UK)
    Iran is training Hizbullah fighters to carry out drone attacks on Israel at a rapidly-expanding top secret base.
    Located five miles from Qom, the drone facility has tripled in size since it was set up in 2006, according to leaked classified Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) documents.
    Once a small airport for crop-spraying planes, it has gone from a runway of 500 meters in 2007 to 1,500 meters in 2020, allowing for bigger, long-range drones such as those used in Iran's aerial assault on Israel on April 13.
    The Gangine center, which has remained secret until now, serves as a drone pilot training center for Lebanese Hizbullah.

The Campus Protests Are Not "Antiwar" or "Pro-Palestinian." They Are "Anti-Israel" - Ramesh Ponnuru (Washington Post)
    The Associated Press says the campus demonstrators are "antiwar protesters." The New York Times has gone with "pro-Palestinian." These aren't neutral, or accurate, descriptions.
    A leading group backing the demonstrations, Students for Justice in Palestine, exulted in the terrorist attack "against the Zionist enemy" on Oct. 7.
    Terrorist-group regalia has been spotted at protests at Yale, Princeton, and Stanford. Incidents too numerous to count have led the Anti-Defamation League to labeled the Columbia demonstrators "pro-Hamas activists."
    Peace is not the organizing principle of the protests.
    The protesters at Columbia have listed several official demands. They don't include that Hamas release all its hostages.
    The protests are not even bringing attention to the plight of Gazans. They're bringing attention to the protesters.
    The media should call the protests what they are: anti-Israel.
    The writer is the editor of National Review and a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

The Women Cheering on Hamas Rapists - Zoe Strimpel (Telegraph-UK)
    There are women leading protests on university campuses, wrapped in keffiyehs and a face covering, passionately crying out for what they call freedom fighters and their "just war" against Zionist genocide and the general existence of the Jewish state.
    What they are doing - explicitly in many cases - is teeny-bopping for Hamas, as girls used to yell and scream for the Beatles.
    It's truly chilling. Too many pro-Hamas, pro-Palestine women claim the acts of sexual violence carried out by Hamas on Oct. 7 are Zionist fabrications.
    Others know perfectly well that the rape, torture and abductions happened, but seem to think it's all wonderfully noble "resistance."
    These protest babes, ardent, self-righteous, are cheering on terrorists who, when not raping women, insist on a brutal patriarchal society.
    Do these women really want an ISIS-style caliphate?
    Do they want rape and the threat of murder as an instrument of control as the framework for society in which all must live?
    Or do they only want these things for the "Zionists"?

Israeli Islamist Leader: Islam Will Enter the White House and Will Conquer Europe  (MEMRI TV)
    Sheikh Raed Salah, head of the outlawed Northern Branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel, said in a February 2, 2024, sermon posted on Mawteni48 that the world must prepare for the "day after in America."
    He said that America has grown old, that it is on the verge of retirement.
    Salah quoted a hadith according to which the Muslims will take over a "white house," and claimed that it refers to Islam taking over the White House in Washington.
    He said the future caliphate will spread Islam into every home in every continent in the world, including in America.
    He stated that Islam will conquer Rome, which symbolizes all of Europe.

Success in Gaza: The IDF's New Eitan Armored Personnel Carrier - Yoav Zitun (Ynet News)
    The IDF's new Eitan heavy armored personnel carriers (APC) began their operational deployment on Oct. 7 when they were brought to the combat zones in the Gaza envelope and deployed as a barrier between the terrorists' infiltration routes and the communities close to the border.
    Initially, in the combat in Gaza, they mainly served for the rapid extraction of wounded from the battlefield. So far, over 250 wounded soldiers have been evacuated with the new APCs.
    Subsequently, as proficiency with them increased, they were also used for operational incursions deep into the war zone.
    The Eitan APC is capable of speeds of 100 km/h, two to three times faster than the older IDF APCs, which allow it to evade Hamas anti-tank rockets.
    "No soldier was harmed inside the Eitan APC, because it is a very fast vehicle that can deal with various threats," says a Defense Ministry source.