Author: Blazingcatfur

The contrast between the august library at the Royal United Services Institute and the 43-minute film screened within it was acute. RUSI is an independent think tank devoted to fostering measured research and civilised debate, men and women employing humankind’s best attributes to try to solve differences and problems. The images screened in RUSI’s Whitehall headquarters last night, however, showed our species at its absolute rock-bottom worst.

How did we reach a point where so many Western leftists see Hamas as a ‘progressive’ movement? Its terrorist slaughter of 1,200 Israelis and others on 7 October is already being downplayed or forgotten entirely. Meanwhile, few mention Hamas’s intolerance towards political opposition, its curtailment of women’s rights, its criminalisation of homosexuality or its persecution of Christians. Human-rights campaigner Peter Tatchell was even barred from the anti-Israel march in London on Armistice Day for a placard that criticised Hamas.

Now is not the time for progressive infighting

While Jews often seem clannish to outsiders, the reality is somewhat different: we have always suffered from a divisive streak of self-destructiveness. As far back as the levelling of the Temple and the expulsion from the homeland, Jewish unity has been undermined by both class divisions and theological disagreements. Two thousand years later, though General Titus’s legions may be forgotten, fissures and infighting remain.

Since October 7, there has been a very real upsurge in antisemitism in Europe and America. Some members of my own synagogue openly discuss whether they should attend services, or events such as menorah lightings; others are considering buying guns.

The first group of hostages have been released from Gaza after 48 days of captivity as part of a truce deal between Israel and Hamas that went into effect this morning – with children and a grandmother thought to have died in captivity among them.

Thirteen Israeli women and children and 11 Thai and Filipino hostages, who were kidnapped and taken into the territory by the terror group in its October 7 attack on Israel, were finally freed today after an agonising wait.

Israeli media reported the hostages had been transferred by Hamas to the Red Cross, then on to the Egyptians, before crossing into Egypt. Live footage showed the hostages leaving Red Cross vans and entering a trauma centre at the Rafah Crossing to undergo medical examinations.