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In-Depth Issues:
U.S. Sanctions Two More ICC Judges Directly Engaged in the Illegitimate Targeting of Israel ( U.S. State Department)
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Dec. 18:
"Today, I am designating two International Criminal Court (ICC) judges, Gocha Lordkipanidze of Georgia and Erdenebalsuren Damdin of Mongolia."
"These individuals have directly engaged in efforts by the ICC to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute Israeli nationals, without Israel's consent."
"The ICC has continued to engage in politicized actions targeting Israel, which set a dangerous precedent for all nations."
"We will not tolerate ICC abuses of power that violate the sovereignty of the United States and Israel and wrongly subject U.S. and Israeli persons to the ICC's jurisdiction."
"Our message to the Court has been clear: the United States and Israel are not party to the Rome Statute and therefore reject the ICC's jurisdiction."
The Growing Threat from the ICC to America - Editorial ( Wall Street Journal)
The Trump Administration sanctioned two more judges of the International Criminal Court on Thursday, but meeting the growing threat from the ICC to America requires stronger action.
The ICC in The Hague has no jurisdiction over the U.S. or Israel, which are not members, but that won't stop the court.
Prominent international lawyers, along with expert ICC advisers, have been pushing the court to prosecute President Trump. After his term in office ends, he will be vulnerable.
The Hague has no business exercising jurisdiction over U.S. leaders or troops. But the ICC doesn't see it that way.
In May 2024 the court threatened Members of Congress who urged sanctions against it. Their crime? Obstruction of justice under the court's founding Rome Statute, which the U.S. never ratified. This is international lawlessness, not law.
Sanctioning a few staff members every few months won't deter ICC abuse. The way to change this is to sanction the institution as a whole until it changes course to respect its original legal limits.
Scandal Leaves International Criminal Court Grasping for Legitimacy amid Probe of Israel - Anne Bayefsky ( Fox News)
The top prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), Karim Khan, faces serious allegations of criminal misconduct, including claims of repeated sexual assault. Khan has been on paid leave since May.
Khan's reported suggestion that his accuser - who is also Muslim - was influenced by Israeli intelligence has drawn skepticism.
On May 2, 2024, Khan learned that word of the allegations had circulated within the ICC as he and his staff were preparing for a trip to Israel, following an extraordinary offer of cooperation from Jerusalem.
Instead, on May 20, Khan abruptly canceled the trip and very publicly announced on CNN that he was seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
Americans, Israelis and even ICC staff speculated about the timing, arguing that Khan hoped that framing Israel would lead to circling the wagons around him.
He has been using Israel as a foil to defend himself against personal allegations.
The writer is director of the Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust, and president of Human Rights Voices.
How Israel Thwarted Hizbullah's Plan to Create a "Terror Ship" - Itay Ilnai ( Israel Hayom)
On Nov. 2, 2024, Israeli Navy commandos silently raided the Lebanese coastal town of Batroun, 87 miles from the Israeli border, and removed Imad Amhaz while he slept in his bed without firing a single shot.
Amhaz, 39, a Shiite, joined Hizbullah in 2004. In 2007, he completed a several-month military course in Iran.
Israeli intelligence noted that Amhaz was meeting with senior Hizbullah officials including Ali Abed al-Hassan Nour al-Din, who is married to the daughter of Fuad Shukr, Hizbullah's chief of staff until his assassination in July 2024.
Amhaz was chosen to be the captain of Hizbullah's "Secret Naval File." The project was directed personally by Hassan Nasrallah and Fuad Shukr.
The goal was to create a Hizbullah "terror ship" - a large civilian merchant vessel that could roam the seas without suspicion, enter civilian ports, and carry out attacks that would change the balance of terror against Israel and its allies.
"Think about September 11 - you take a civilian platform and use it to carry out a strategic terror act. This was the goal," said Rear Adm. A., Head of Naval Intelligence.
One can only imagine the kind of attacks the Hizbullah leadership planned to carry out using the terror ship: the hijacking of a passenger ship, an attack on the Karish gas field, a raid by dozens of armed operatives on Israel's Haifa or Ashdod ports.
We Are in a Religious War - Nadav Shragai ( Israel Hayom)
Before we talk about refugees, territory, or the debate over a Palestinian state, what we are in is a religious war.
Anyone who reads the manifestos of Iran and its affiliates, and studies their religious texts, will discover that they are willing to tolerate us under one condition: that we Islamize.
The hostages and released captives repeatedly report how their captors tried to convert them.
The Islamic religious justification for annihilating the Jewish people, should we refuse, is drawn from an established religious doctrine.
Some even believe that Allah allowed the State of Israel to be established in order to gather the Jews in one place and make their extermination easier.
Even the supposedly "moderate" Palestinian Authority is part of this religious war. Still today, the PA refuses to recognize Israel as a Jewish state and has rejected every demand to do so.
The PA also wants to turn back the clock, to bring millions of descendants of refugees here to reestablish an Arab-Muslim majority. Bottom line: The PA is no different from Hamas.
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News Resources - North America, Europe, and Asia:
- Netanyahu to Brief Trump on Iran's Expanding Ballistic Missile Program - Gordon Lubold
Israeli officials have grown increasingly concerned that Iran is expanding production of its ballistic missile program, and are preparing to brief President Trump about options for attacking it again, according to a person with direct knowledge of the plans and four former U.S. officials briefed on the plans.
Left unchecked, Iran's production of ballistic missiles could increase to as many as 3,000 per year. "The threat of the missiles is very real, and we weren't able to prevent them all last time," said a former Israeli official. Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu are to meet later this month in Florida. (NBC News)
- U.S. Strikes Islamic State Targets in Syria - Eric Schmitt
The U.S. carried out major airstrikes against the Islamic State in Syria on Friday to avenge the deaths of two U.S. Army soldiers and a civilian U.S. interpreter killed in a terrorist attack on Dec. 13 in Palmyra, where they were supporting counterterrorism operations. American fighter jets, attack helicopters and artillery fired more than 100 munitions at 70 suspected Islamic State targets in central Syria, U.S. Central Command said. Jordanian planes assisted in the operation.
"This is not the beginning of a war - it is a declaration of vengeance," said Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. On the day of the attack, Hegseth wrote on X: "If you target Americans - anywhere in the world - you will spend the rest of your brief, anxious life knowing the United States will hunt you, find you, and ruthlessly kill you." (New York Times)
- U.S. Pitches "Project Sunrise" to Turn Gaza into High-Tech Metropolis - Alexander Ward
Welcome to "Project Sunrise," the Trump administration's pitch to foreign governments and investors to turn Gaza's rubble into a futuristic coastal destination. A team led by top White House aides Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff developed a draft proposal to convert the enclave into a gleaming metropolis. In 32 pages of PowerPoint slides, the plan outlines steps to take Gaza residents from tents to penthouses and from poverty to prosperity.
The project would cost $112 billion over 10 years. The U.S. would commit to supporting nearly $60 billion in grants and guarantees on debt. Supporters of the project insist that letting a burgeoning humanitarian crisis fester in Gaza is a far worse alternative. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Friday, "You are not going to convince anyone to invest money in Gaza if they believe another war is going to happen in two, three years."
The presentation is labeled "sensitive but unclassified," and doesn't go into details about which countries would fund Gaza's rebuilding. Nor does it specify where precisely the 2 million displaced Palestinians would live during reconstruction. Steven Cook, a senior fellow for the Middle East at the Council on Foreign Relations, said, "Nothing happens until Hamas disarms. Hamas will not disarm, so nothing will happen."
U.S. officials say "Project Sunrise" shows the administration is now directly engaged in nation-building in Gaza. Cook added, "If they say they aren't nation-building, they hope people will believe it. But they are nation-building." (Wall Street Journal)
See also Trump's Gaza Peace Plan Stumbles over Hamas Disarmament - Feliz Solomon
President Trump's phased peace plan for Gaza is hitting obstacles in Hamas's refusal to disarm and Israel's unwillingness to retreat from the enclave until that happens. The second phase of the plan requires Hamas to give up governance, disarm and transfer control of the territory to an international force of troops and a technocratic committee of Palestinians who would run it.
But Hamas still controls half of Gaza and refuses to disarm. Most countries won't send troops into Hamas territory as long as the U.S.-designated terrorist group remains there. In Trump's eagerness to secure a deal that would stop the fighting, analysts said Washington was willing to move ahead without a clear commitment from Hamas to disarm.
"Nobody wants to go in and fight Hamas to remove their weapons," said former U.S. ambassador to Israel Daniel Shapiro. "The most important sticking point here is reality," said Ofer Shelah of the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security Studies.
(Wall Street Journal)
News Resources - Israel and the Mideast:
- Israeli Critically Wounded after Running toward Sydney Attacker - Roy Rubinstein
At Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, on Dec. 14, an Israeli, Gefen Biton, 30, ran toward the gunfire to help others and was critically wounded. Biton, who has been working in Australia for the past three years, arrived at the candle-lighting event on the beach with a close friend. In a video filmed by an amateur and broadcast by local Channel 7, Biton is seen running toward one of the attackers whom Sydney resident Ahmed al-Ahmed had confronted moments earlier, before being shot.
Tom Cohen, an Israeli living in Australia, said, "The video shows Gefen's mentality. He was unarmed, but as an Israeli he chose to confront the danger, put himself in the line of fire and try to save others. He had already gotten out of harm's way and could easily have fled to save himself, but he chose to go back and help more people....He's just a simple Israeli with a huge heart who ran to save locals he didn't know. Now we're waiting for him to wake up." (Ynet News)
- Environmental Terror: Israel Declares West Bank Waste-Burning Fires a National Security Threat - Itamar Eichner
Defense Minister Israel Katz and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich on Thursday defined the threat posed by Palestinian waste-burning fires in Judea and Samaria as a "harm to national security," following an emergency meeting with local authority heads affected by the problem.
Officials were presented with "a troubling situation assessment indicating that this is a far more widespread and severe phenomenon than previously described, constituting a serious and ongoing harm to the environment, quality of life, and public health of residents in the area, including dangerous exposure to toxic and polluting substances."
The Defense Ministry will work with contractors to extinguish fires and remove waste, and to establish a waste disposal site in the area. "We will not allow residents of communities near the seam line to inhale smoke that poisons and harms their health," Katz said. "We are going to treat this with the utmost seriousness, with full force, to solve the problem once and for all." (Ynet News)
Global Commentary and Think-Tank Analysis:
Antisemitism
- My Family Survived Bondi Beach - Arsen Ostrovsky
Three weeks after my family had relocated from Israel to Australia, we were in the crossfire on Bondi Beach.
One of the gunmen's bullets hit my head. I fell to the ground and bled profusely. To my right, an elderly man crouched, covering his wife. He was also hit, not moving. To my left, a few feet away, I saw body parts strewn on the ground. Another man ripped off his shirt and lent it to me to help stop the blood gushing from my head. My wife had managed to escape unharmed and found refuge with our children. Doctors later told me it was millimeters between life and death, "a miracle" I survived.
Over the past two years, the Jewish community has warned time and again that when hatred is allowed to fester, when it is excused, normalized or mainstreamed, it inevitably leads to violence. Australia doesn't need another inquiry, strategy document or press release expressing sorrow. We need urgent, decisive action. Our laws must be enforced. Incitement must have consequences. Intelligence must be acted on and radical Islamic extremism must be confronted, not managed.
The writer, an international human-rights lawyer, heads the Sydney office of the Australia/Israel and Jewish Affairs Council. (Wall Street Journal)
- Australian Teen Wounded while Shielding Children in Bondi Attack Says She Is Not a Hero - Cordelia Hsu
As two gunmen opened fire on hundreds celebrating Hanukkah on Sydney's Bondi Beach, Chaya Dadon, 14, saw two children stranded out in the open, beside their wounded parents. She told Reuters: "I knew in that moment, I felt like God was sitting right next to me. He was whispering into my ear, 'This is your mission: go save those kids.'"
She left the safety of her hiding spot, pulled the children away and jumped on top of them, covering their bodies with her own. At some point, she was shot in the thigh. But she kept shielding them. "I knew I got shot, but I wasn't even worried, I channeled all that energy that I had into strength and I made sure that I knew I had to be there for those kids. If I could give up my life saving these children, that's what I was going to do."
Dadon spent four days at the hospital before returning home on Thursday. She is now walking with crutches, which she has decorated with stickers commemorating some of those who were killed. She still does not know the children she shielded.
(Reuters)
- Bondi Was Not a Surprise - Iona Italia
I am angry at the government for ignoring antisemitic violence and intimidation, at the media for whitewashing it, at the academics who provided it with intellectual legitimacy, and at everyone who marched and chanted and who justified or minimized antisemitism in Australia because of their feelings about a conflict on the other side of the globe.
I am angry at every official who failed to do their due diligence: in neglecting to vet immigrants from countries where vicious antisemitism is endemic; in allowing a man whose son was suspected of involvement with ISIS to legally own multiple firearms; in never taking a clear stand against Jew-hatred in this country. I am angry at the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, who has blamed the tragedy primarily on firearms and who seems unable to name the cause clearly. I can name it: the poisonous hatred of Jews.
I believe that a silent majority of Aussies are heartily sick of the attacks on our harmony, our culture, and our Jews. At Quillette, we stand with Jews in Australia, in Israel, and throughout the world. RIP:
Boris Tetleroyd, Boris Gurman, Sofia Gurman, Reuven Morrison, Edith Brutman, Marika Pogany, Dan Elkayam, Eli Schlanger, Yaakov Levitan, Peter Meagher, Alex Kleytman, Tibor Weitzen, Adam Smyth, Tania Tretiak, and ten-year-old Matilda. May their memories be a blessing.
(Quillette-Australia)
The Arab World
- Qatar's 21st Century Muslim Brotherhood Strategy - Tirza Shorr
Despite Qatar's glamorous public image, it hosts and funds terrorists, serving as the Muslim Brotherhood's de facto headquarters. Hassan al-Banna founded the Muslim Brotherhood in March 1928 with the motto: "Allah is our goal. The Prophet is our leader. The Qur'an is our law. Jihad is our way. Death in the service of Allah is our highest desire." Qatar maintains Hamas leadership in luxury Doha accommodations and has destabilized Libya, Syria, and Tunisia through support for MB-aligned factions.
Qatar funds Al Jazeera and linked English venues amplifying Islamist narratives globally. The Arab Center Washington (ACW) and Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies in Doha, both Qatar Foundation-funded, provide "a steady stream of 'experts' to editors, media, publications, and speaking occasions in the U.S."
Qatar hosts both Hamas and the U.S. military. Al Udeid Air Base houses 8,000 U.S. military personnel - America's largest Middle Eastern installation. The Muslim Brotherhood's unofficial headquarters is now negotiating for America's most advanced weapons, F-35 fighter jets, while hosting a terrorist organization just proscribed by President Trump.
The writer is a senior researcher at the Jerusalem Center.
(Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs)
- Normalization with Saudi Arabia Cannot Begin while Mecca Broadcasts Antisemitic Hate - Editorial
Saudi Arabia cannot ask the world to treat it as a partner for peace while a sermon broadcast from Mecca vilifies Jews and sanctifies their enemies. In an op-ed on Dec. 17, Dr. Edy Cohen, an expert in the Arab world, described the weekly sermon delivered from Islam's holiest site where Sheikh Salih bin Abdullah bin Humaid called on God to punish the Jews.
Such sermons provide moral justification, telling millions of listeners that hostility to Jews is righteousness. Saudi authorities have long regulated mosque preaching - including requiring imams to commit to not using Friday sermons for inflammatory remarks - and dismissing preachers who cross official redlines. What is said from those pulpits should be treated as state-signaled messaging.
Before normalization, Saudi Arabia must first end official, or state-tolerated, antisemitic incitement, especially from platforms tied to the holy sites. If the price of normalization is to normalize the idea that Jews may be cursed from the world's most revered pulpit, while diplomats applaud "progress," then the deal is not peace; it is a mirage, and it will not protect anyone.
(Jerusalem Post)
- Self-Determination for the Amazigh People in Algeria - Dr. Emmanuel Navon
Kabylia is a mountainous region in northern Algeria inhabited predominantly by Amazigh (Berber) populations, estimated at 3-4 million people. They possess a distinct language, a continuous collective identity, shared historical experiences, and durable communal institutions.
Following Algeria's independence in 1962, efforts by the Amazigh population to secure autonomy, decentralization, or constitutional recognition were consistently rejected. Kabylia presents a clear case of denied internal self-determination, in which peaceful and institutional routes for political participation have been systematically closed.
On December 14, 2025, the government-in-exile of the Movement for the Self-Determination of Kabylia (MAK) proclaimed the independence of Kabylia in Paris. Israel's historic periphery strategy sought partnerships with non-Arab states and minority groups marginalized by dominant regional orders. Kabylia represents such an actor in North Africa. It is secular, pro-Western, and opposed to political Islam. Its leadership has expressed solidarity with Israel, including following the events of October 7, 2023.
Algeria already maintains a hostile posture toward Israel and recognition of Kabylia would not significantly alter this dynamic. Israeli engagement with Kabylia would require careful dialogue with Morocco, which maintains opposition to separatism, but Moroccan caution should not be assumed to translate into substantive opposition, particularly given the depth of Israel-Morocco strategic cooperation.
The writer is a senior fellow at JISS.
(Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security)
See also The "Anti-Algeria" - Amine Ayoub
On Dec. 14, the birth of the Federal Republic of Kabylia was formally proclaimed. Kabylia, a region in Algeria, is unabashedly secular, pro-Western, and eager to join the community of free nations. The current Algerian regime is not merely a dictatorship; it is a forward operating base for America's enemies. A free Kabylia would be a democratic wedge driven deep into the heart of the Russia-Iran axis in North Africa.
Like the Jewish people, the Kabyles are an indigenous nation that has survived centuries of Arab-Islamic conquest, preserving their language, culture, and identity against all odds. The Kabylia independence movement views Israel not as an enemy, but as a model of indigenous resilience.
The writer, a fellow at the Middle East Forum, is based in Morocco. (Times of Israel)
Observations:
- The global civilizational conflict between the Free World and the forces of Islamism - a movement that seeks not coexistence, but domination - has only begun. Islamism's most violent expression erupts in the bloodlust of Hamas, ISIS, or al-Qaeda. Yet its more patient, insidious face belongs to the Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliates - groups that have mastered the art of slow infiltration, cultural manipulation, and institutional takeover. Their ambition is the same: the imposition of Sharia and the submission of free societies.
- I was raised in Malmo, Sweden, where I watched firsthand the quiet surrender of a liberal Western city to Islamist intimidation. Today, similar scenes unfold in London, Paris, Toronto, Sydney, and New York, where since Oct. 7, 2023, Islamists have marched openly through Western capitals, waving the flags of terror movements and calling for "global intifada."
- The response from many Western governments has been paralysis: fear of being called "Islamophobic" outweighs the courage to name the threat. Listen carefully to what Islamists say in their own rallies and mosques. They boast of taking over Western institutions. They preach that democracy is a tool to be exploited until the day it can be replaced. They view liberal tolerance not as a virtue but as a weakness to be exploited.
- The same ideology that sent Hamas terrorists across Israel's border on Oct. 7 now works methodically to seize student unions, civil-society groups, and local councils across Europe and North America.
In Britain, dozens of municipalities are now governed by officials who declare loyalty not to the United Kingdom but to the global Islamic nation. In the process, this ideology has fueled a resurgence of antisemitism and social fragmentation in the West.
- This war is not over. It will only end when Islamism - violent and non-violent alike - is defeated intellectually, financially, and politically. Education must be our front line. That begins with dismantling UNRWA, whose curriculum perpetuates hate and martyrdom in Gaza's classrooms. A generation taught that killing Jews is holy cannot build peace.
- Governments should outlaw Islamist organizations where evidence ties them to terror networks. The Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliates should be designated terrorist entities. Qatar and Turkey - state sponsors of this ideology - must face consequences, not indulgence. Political correctness is a luxury we can no longer afford. This war will decide the fate of the entire Free World.
The writer, a former IDF international spokesman, is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
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