The way I see international law now: 1) World War II happened 2) The victors decided that the League of Nations had failed so they would do something better for them 3) they made everybody sign all kinds of treaties structured it so that they could claim a new world order based on western values of humanity, rights, and equality. Authoritarians played along. The most important of these laws was “don’t invade countries.” Countries in this order were like individuals in a democracy—sovereignty was the cornerstone. 4) they made the UNGA that gave everybody an equal voice regardless of how evil they were—BUT they gave it no legislative authority, because nobody would sign away sovereignty to a world government, and they weren’t crazy—democracies were the minority after all. 5) they made the UNSC so the victors could keep order and impose new “laws” that everybody had to follow 6) the majority of the permanent members were democracies but the communists had a veto too 7) but the Cold War was happening and the communists spent decades coming up with new ways to undermine the democracies’ structural advantage 8) the key was that the communists cared more about conquering the institutions than the democracies cared about preserving them 9) so democracies filled the institutions with people who were committed to playing along with the official rhetoric rather than actually caring about preserving Western dominance 10) inevitably the institutions became vehicles for authoritarian power 11) Israel was a convenient flashpoint for attacking Western authority and power—so much latent global antisemitism could be leveraged, it’s a small country so the West wouldn’t put up much of a fight, and the UN from the beginning made Israel less equal than others 12) USSR fell and it took some time but Russia eventually took the first shot against the core of it all, invading Ukraine with full knowledge that the UNSC would be paralyzed because they had a veto. 13) after 10/7 it became impossible to deny that the West had completely lost control of the game 14) it is only now, so many decades later, that the U.S. has had enough and sees that the system works far more against the West and its interests than for it. If they can do that to Israel, the U.S. is not far behind. 15) a new system will likely arise—I’m guessing it will include only the U.S. and committed allies, democratic or otherwise. At some point the U.S. will dismantle the UN by giving major incentives to other countries that will have to choose between the two systems. 16) the point is that the world order is in the process of being reinvented in the US’s favor. It will be rocky. But there is no going back.

Hamas says Sasha Troufanov "is not in good enough condition to be released". What have the monsters done to him???!!!! Starved, tortured, abused, and now they don't want the world to see the results of it, so they keep holding him????? Sasha is Amazon employee. Amazon company hasn't said a word about him all this time. Even Putin, by demanding Sasha's release since he has Russian citizenship, has done more for Sasha than Amazon.

I worked with a guy who was the Middle East analyst at the cabinet office here in the UK.....Since October 7th, he has ONLY criticised Israel and, more recently, President Trump. It was his job to advise the cabinet on the Middle East, and he never even remotely criticised Hamas, Hezbollah or the Houthis. The overwhelming majority of British NGOs published reports about the impact of Israel's military action in Gaza, and called for an immediate, unconditional ceasefire, without calling for the release of hostages. The mother of my children, whose own children are Jewish, was given a book during her MA studies in international relations that talks about how Hamas is a great resistance movement and that suggesting they are terrorists is a silly simplification of who they truly are (the book was written by a Muslim, Arab professor). You have no idea how anti-Israel and anti-Jewish the UK is. Every single aspect of the civil service, police, academia, and the media, is infiltrated by people who either have immigrant roots and ideologically belong with terrorist groups or British useful idiots.

Today the worst ghosts of the history of the Jewish people came back to haunt. We once again saw images of gaunt, glazed-eyed Jews limping out of captivity to freedom. While their starved bodies echoed the torture endured by Holocaust survivors, their circumstances did also. They emerged from hell to discover, like so many Holocaust survivors, that their entire families were murdered by their captors. And yet, even as these echoes resonate so strongly, you will not hear a whisper of this parallel from the Irish commentariat. People who have been so gleefully eager to abuse and distort the Holocaust to weaponise it against Israel. That is because, to them, Jewish tragedy of the past is nothing more than a stick with which to beat Jewish people in the present.

On October 7th, I told myself that at least the world will finally see Hamas for what it is. I told myself there is no way, after what Hamas did, that any moral person would stand with them. I was dead wrong. Today, I want to believe that after seeing what Hamas did to those hostages, that there won’t be a single moral person who will stand with them. Sadly, I know I’m wrong again. Dear humanity, you have failed.

The world has failed… again. The reckoning will come… it always does… but what then? If the Holocaust wasn’t enough to prevent the global ‘buy in’ to October 7 then how the hell will October 7 be enough to stop the next one? My take on the three hostages just released… and the sh_t show that got us here…

I’m not Jewish, but there’s a reason that I’ve risked everything to speak up for the Jewish community. And when I say everything, I mean everything. I mean being blocked by friends that I grew up with, unfollowed by most friends and associates, accused of being a spy for the Mossad, IRGC, CIA etc, having my family accused of the same and having their lives put at risk to the extent of having to contact the FBI, being subjected to unthinkable smears, conspiracies, and rumors that are intended to blacklist me from everywhere and by everyone, but I still speak up despite it all, you know why? Because the same time that Jews had to watch their children being shot and kidnapped on October 7 Is the same time they had to watch half the world protest against the existence of their tiny Jewish state that is their only refuge from global genocide Is the same time they had to watch their friends, associates, celebrities, and the world’s body politic post paragliders in celebration of their massacre Is the same time they had to watch their synagogues go up in flames amid renewed pogroms in Europe Is the same time they had to be banned and blacklisted as persona non gratas of the world by trading the word “Jews” for “Zionists” Is the same time they had to be pushed back by human chains on college campuses and beaten unconscious for defying chants for their death Is the same time they had to watch a mentally ill rapper tell millions of his followers that he loves Hitler and supports the Holocaust Is the same time they had to watch the likes of Dan Bilzerian, Candace Owens, Jake Shields, and the rest of the “woke right” claim “Jewish supremacy” is the world’s biggest problem by citing obscure texts of the Talmud & claiming to “seek truth” while regurgitating antisemitic Soviet disinformation to justify their persecution Is the same time they had to watch the woke left claim that the victims of Islamist extremism deserved the October 7 horrors because their grandparents who fled Nazi Germany back to Palestine in refugee boats were actually “white colonizers” All while the world looks on and glibly asks, “what antisemitism?” That’s why I speak up. The most important thing I’ve realized is that nobody can take from you what doesn’t belong to them. They can silence, intimidate, threaten, and accuse you, but they can never take away the power of your voice when it bellows into the scorched earth the last hopeful, fragmented glimmers of truth. That belongs to you and nobody else, and in our lifetime, it may never be more important than now.

@antonioguterres Imagine Americans talking about giving Japanese the State of California after Pearl Harbor. Or saying Al Qaeda should get the State of Pennsylvania after 9/11. You people sound drunk 🤣.

You really, REALLY, don't have to do this, BBC. You don't have to post a picture of a man who is obviously emaciated and then somehow couch it with *his family thinks he looks gaunt*. You don't have to insult the intelligence of anyone with eyes and a working brain.

My wife started MEMRI with Yigal Carmen because the Palestinians never hid their intentions. They crowed about their murderous hatred constantly. But we in the West & Israel simply chose either not to listen or to so dismiss Palestinians as clownish that we negated their threat.

Watch the powerful role fabric plays in the reunion of hostage Eli Sharabi with his family. Eli wears the Israeli flag, and his brother Sharon puts on a Jewish prayer shawl at first hug. As the family unites, two Jewish cloths, national & spiritual, unite.