PHILADELPHIA – October 8, 2023 – The following analysts and scholars are available to comment on Hamas's ongoing attacks on Israel, Israel's response, and what the situation means for the region and the world.
In the United States:
Daniel Pipes is president of the Middle East Forum, which he has led since its founding in 1994. His policy recommendations emerge from thinking through what U.S. policy toward the region should be – including urging Israel to take out Hamas instead of continuing the failed status quo. The author of 16 books on the Middle East, Islam, and other topics, he served in five U.S. administrations, received two presidential appointments, and testified before many congressional committees. His work has been translated into 39 languages. He received both his A.B. and Ph.D. in Middle East history from Harvard.
Gregg Roman, director of the Middle East Forum, previously served as the political advisor to the deputy foreign minister of Israel and worked for the Israeli Ministry of Defense. An advocate of total Israeli victory over Hamas, his policy prescriptions emerge from his years spent in Israel, fluency in Hebrew, and deep familiarity with both the American and Israeli domestic and foreign policy apparatuses. A frequent speaker at venues around the world, Roman attended American University in Washington, D.C., and the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) in Herzliya, Israel, where he studied national security studies and political communications.
In Israel:
Nave Dromi is primarily responsible for the day-to-day activities of the Israel Victory Project (IVP) in Israel, a project of MEF. A journalist, author, and native Israeli, her insights into how best to deal with threats to Israel stem from her deep familiarity with all facets of Israeli political life. She works closely with members of the Knesset Israel Victory Caucus, opinion-shapers, members of the defense establishment, and Israeli social sectors to further the victory paradigm. A former commander in the Israel Defense Forces and frequent contributor to Haaretz, Dromi previously worked at the Institute for Zionist Strategies.
Ashley Perry is an adviser to the Middle East Forum's Israel office. A veteran of numerous political campaigns in Israel and elsewhere, he has an insider's grasp of how effective policy is made and, equally important, executed. He served as an adviser to Israel's foreign minister and deputy prime minister from 2009 to 2015. Originally from the United Kingdom, he moved to Israel in 2001. Perry holds a bachelor's degree from University College London and a master's degree from Reichman University (IDC Herzliya).
Alex Selsky is a senior adviser to the Israel Victory Project and member of the board of directors of Middle East Forum-Israel. A political and policy expert whose views are drawn from real world experience, he previously served as an advisor to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and was spokesman of the Israeli National Economic Council. Selsky is a reserve major at the IDF Homefront Command emergency information unit and holds a B.A .in Business and an Executive M.A. in Public Policy from Hebrew University.
Jonathan Spyer, a journalist, oversees the Forum's content and is editor of the Middle East Quarterly. No armchair analyst, Spyer has reported from military units in Iraq, Syria, and throughout the region so that he experiences the effects of policy decisions on-the-ground with those most affected. He has a B.A. from the London School of Economics, an M.A. from the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, and a Ph.D. from the London School of Economics. Spyer is the author of two books: The Transforming Fire: The Rise of the Israel-Islamist Conflict (2010) and Days of the Fall: A Reporter's Journey in the Syria and Iraq Wars (2017).
Benjamin Weinthal, a Ginsburg/Milstein Writing Fellow at the Middle East Forum, is an investigative journalist known for his in-depth reports. Based in Jerusalem, he writes about the Middle East for Fox News Digital and the Jerusalem Post. He earned his B.A. from New York University and holds an MPhil from the University of Cambridge. Weinthal's commentary has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Haaretz, the Guardian, Politico, the New York Daily News, the New York Post, and many additional North American and European outlets.
The Middle East Forum, a Philadelphia-based think tank, is dedicated to defining American interests in the Middle East and protecting America from Islamist threats. It achieves its goals through intellectual, activist, and philanthropic efforts. For more information, visit www.meforum.org.
The Middle East Forum has over fifty research professionals available for comment to policymakers, journalists, and public officials. Our expertise spans a wide range of Middle East issues. As a nonpartisan organization, MEF is widely respected for operating independent of political and commercial pressures.
Looking for experts in other topic areas? Visit MEF's Staff and Fellows page for up-to-date lists of expert.
For immediate release
For more information, contact:
Gregg Roman
roman@meforum.org
+1 (215) 546 5406
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Israel at War Once Again
By Sherwin Pomerantz
For us living in Jerusalem it started as a rare air raid siren at 8:15 in the morning yesterday, as we were gathered in the synagogue for shabbat services which overlapped with the holiday of simchat torah as well, the celebration of the end of the annual Torah reading cycle and the immediate beginning again of a new one all packed into one day.
While it is rare to hear sirens in Jerusalem, it was not the first time that we had experienced this and everyone went downstairs to the shelter on the ground level to wait 10 minutes. If there was not another siren it was safe to leave, and so we did so after that time and returned to the sanctuary to continue the prayers. But ten minutes later it happened again and 20 minutes after that again, and then we knew this was not an ordinary sequence of events. For sure something very serious was going on in the country. But it was the sabbath, so nobody had phones with them, yet it was clear that the standard order of services could not be continued.
Finally, someone went to their home across the street, retrieved a phone and we heard the news that Israel had been attacked yet again, “yet again” as I commented in an op ed last week. The decision was then made that those people who were physically challenged and could not easily go up and down the stairs constantly within the 90 second time frame allotted to get safely to the shelter, should go home. In addition, those who lived close enough to get home before the next potential siren should also leave. Those who remained in the shelter did their best to complete the service, albeit foreshortened and eliminating the joyous dancing with the Torah that is part and parcel of this particular holiday observance.
Mercifully for us living here in Jerusalem, the last alert was at 1130 in the morning and since then, we have heard nothing further. When the sabbath ended just before 7 PM, we began to learn the awful truth.
Israel had been attacked once again by Hamas operatives in Gaza. Over 3,000 rockets were lobbed at Israel from Gaza, enough to make it impossible for the Iron Dome protective system to neutralize each of them. Thus, many of them landed in populated areas setting buildings on fire, causing serious damage and putting people in danger of both life and limb.
But that was not the worst of it. Hamas had mounted a well-planned calibrated attack by land, sea and air to successfully penetrate Israel’s south. Using heavy equipment, they were able to bulldoze an opening in the border fence that separates Israel from Gaza so that hundreds of terrorists could simply walk into Israel as well as enter the country with vehicles that quickly put them in the center of dozens of communities in the south. In preparation for the attack advanced troops had disabled a police station near the border and virtually neutralized an army base allowing the terrorist unfettered access to the populated areas in what is called the Gaza envelope.
Others entered Israel by air on motorized paragliders that allowed Hamas troops to land in populated areas of the south as well. The third leg of the attack was by sea where some of their ships were able to discharge troops on the shore close to Israeli communities in the south. But the most serious attack was by land over the border.
They then went on a shooting spree firing at everything in sight. Dozens of Israeli young adults had planned a Friday night nature event in a field near the border. They were unprotected and awoke to masked terrorists running at them and firing with automatic rifles. Many of these young people made up a large number of the casualties. A family I know from Chicago had a son in the group whom they have not heard from since 8 AM Saturday. We hope he is ok. Oner of the facts of life in a country this small when the damage is this great is that we always personally know people who are directly affected.
Other terrorists took their vehicles into the towns near the border and began a killing spree, mowing people down execution style. They went house to house killing people in their own beds. One youngster hiding under a bed called emergency services to report that her parents had been killed and she needed help to survive. Other victims were captured on the streets of the local cities and forced into waiting vehicles, after they were beaten and subdued, and then taken to Gaza as hostages.
As of this writing on Sunday afternoon in Israel, the reports from the government talk about more than 600 dead, over 2,000 wounded (many in critical condition) and 100 or more hostages taken, both civilian and military. No doubt some of those numbers will grow. Many of the people hospitalized are seriously wounded. There are also people still unaccounted for. And as of this writing fighting is still going on inside Israel as the IDF works to take back control of all of the cities, kibbutzim and moshavim in the south. That work is still under way.
No question people are understandably worried. We have close friends who have seven grandchildren in the military right now and the grandmother can hardly speak she is so distraught. We have another friend, a native Israeli, with five grandchildren in the military who plainly says this is worse than anything she has ever seen.
We will prevail. Most of us have no doubt about that. Nevertheless, we also know that the price will be high, we will bury many of our children, husbands, fathers, siblings, and friends. The pain will often be too much to bear. However, we have no other country, no other place to go, nor do we want to be in any other place. As in the past, war unites out people and the differences that played out so dramatically over the last nine months are now all suspended. Unity is the name of the game, singularity of purpose is the watchword and victory is the only choice.
We pray, as well, that the good Lord will watch over us and over our military and government so that we may remain here in the land we prayed for over the last 2,000 years and which we have developed so capably over the last 75. May our prayers be answered and may our children return home safely.
Sherwin Pomerantz has lived in Israel for 40 years, is CEO of Atid EDI Ltd., an international business development consultancy, former National President of the Association of Americans & Canadians in Israel and form Board Chair of the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies
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Press Release
Contact: Sarah Stern
(202) 601-7421
Date: October 8, 2023 |
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ISRAEL IS AT WAR | (October 8, 2023, Washington, DC) - Yesterday, the peaceful calm of Shabbat and Simchat Torah was punctured by a well-orchestrated attack by Hamas terrorists, making it the bloodiest single day in Israel’s history. It is estimated that more than a hundred civilians, men, women, children, teenagers, the elderly and the handicapped were kidnapped, and paraded through the streets of Gaza. We have no idea if they are being raped, tortured, dead or alive. Beyond that, over 600 people have been killed in that one single day, and over 2,000 wounded. And missiles emanating from Gaza have been launched from the sky into Israeli cities.
There is no doubt in our minds that these are barbarous attacks. Israel is fighting to defend its civilian population. Any notion of the “cycle of violence” is absurd. These are terrorists who have infiltrated into Israeli communities and have abducted Israeli civilians from their homes, butchering them on the roads and on bus stops, paragliding into an open-air dance festival in the desert and abducting young, innocent people.
While the events haven't ended yet, this dark day marks an unprecedented tragedy in the history of Israel. This has been orchestrated by Iran, and all of its terrorist proxy groups, in a genocidal war against Israel and the Jewish people. And while mourning in shock and disbelief, we hope that this gives the world a glimpse of what many of Israel's enemies and haters mean by "free Palestine”: the indiscriminate mass murder of Jews in their towns, streets, shops, and from their very own living rooms.
This is a test of good versus evil, and the United States must remain on the side of the good. We were very encouraged by President Biden’s statement, and know that now support is bipartisan, and we hope that people on both sides of the aisle will remember who is the arsonist and who is the firefighter.
This, as we, at EMET, have been saying for years, is a product of what the Palestinians have been taught in their schools, in their media, from the sermons from their imams. It is in the very oxygen that they breathe. Can any of us, therefore be surprised that they have raised a generation or two that wants to kill Jews?
We have no idea how this is going to end, but the reserves have been called up to the northern front, where Hezbollah is equipped with more than 150,000missiles, some of which have been converted into precision guided munitions.
We know that Iran has its fingerprints all over this operation.
EMET will be on Capitol Hill, ensuring that Israel is able to protect itself, by itself. Our goals will be:
· Helping Israel protect and defend its civilian population. They will need more iron-dome protection, particularly if, as we fear, more fronts will open up.
· Supporting Israel in degrading and destroying the Islamic terrorist organization Hamas to ensure the safety and security of its citizens.
· Painfully and severely punishing the Islamic Republic of Iran, the global sponsor of terrorism, and preventing any attempt to ease or relieve sanctions.
· Forcing Qatar to choose between remaining a major non-NATOa lly of the United States and hosting the Hamas leadership. Such support for terrorism must stop if Qatar still wants to pretend it is a member of the international polite society.
What happened yesterday was nothing short of a “pogrom” against the Jewish people and the state of Israel.
We pledge to work with every ounce of our being to ensure that this never happens again. About The Endowment for Middle East Truth
Founded in 2005, EMET is a pro-American, pro-Israel, and pro-human rights, foreign policy think tank and policy shop in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.emetonline.org ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ |
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