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Jerusalem Center for Security
and Foreign Affairs
DAILY ALERT
Tuesday,
September 22, 2026
In-Depth Issues:

Iranian Children Recruited for "Self-Sacrifice" Campaign - Danielle Greyman-Kennard (Jerusalem Post)
    Male children under the age of 15 will soon be recruited to join the Islamic Republic's Janfada (self-sacrifice) campaign, the Iranian Labor News Agency reported. Females would need to reach the age of 18.
    The Geneva Conventions prohibit the recruitment of minors under the age of 15 by armed groups, while Iran has admitted recruiting children as young as 12.
    Military training for the campaign is set to begin in Tehran this week.
    They will be trained in "ensuring local security, general war preparations, observation, surveillance, and intelligence measures," as well as "guiding micro-aircraft (drones), which are used in military operations," and "the possibility of using shoulder-launched weapons."
    The campaign's spokesperson, Sasan Zare, said it was centered on the cultural slogan, "We have one life, and we give it for Iran."


How Hamas Controls the Story Coming Out of Gaza - Khaled Abu Toameh (Gatestone Institute)
    Palestinian journalist and photographer Motaz Azaiza's images from Gaza reached millions of people around the world. He was named one of TIME magazine's "100 Most Influential People."
    Azaiza recently revealed how journalists operated under Hamas rule. They were pressured to suppress criticism of Hamas.
    When Palestinians blamed Israel, the cameras kept rolling. When Palestinians blamed Hamas, the cameras were turned off.
    Azaiza said that stepping outside this framework exposes journalists to intense backlash, including organized online campaigns, accusations of treason, and physical intimidation inside Gaza.
    He also disclosed that he grew up supporting Hamas and that Hamas's culture of "resistance" was part of his childhood environment.
    These admissions help explain why the outside world has heard relatively little from Gaza about Hamas's responsibility for the suffering of Palestinians under its rule.
    How much of the story coming out of Gaza has been shaped by what journalists were permitted to show?
    Journalism conducted under intimidation cannot automatically be treated as independent journalism.
    Azaiza also said he filmed Israeli hostages being beaten by Palestinian crowds after they were kidnapped to Gaza. He said he chose not to publish the footage because he feared that publication could allow Israel to identify the people involved.
    Azaiza's account offers a possible explanation for one of the most striking features of the coverage from Gaza: the extraordinary visibility of Palestinian suffering accompanied by comparatively little visibility of Palestinian anger toward Hamas.
    Azaiza's interview proves that the process by which information emerged from Gaza was not as independent as many people assumed.


The "Fauda" Enigma - Thane Rosenbaum (Los Angeles Jewish Journal)
    The fifth season of Netflix's global thriller, "Fauda," is now streaming, ten years after the improbable hit television series first introduced the gritty realism and high drama of Israeli counterespionage to the world of undercover cop procedurals.
    Each season landed in the top 10 in the 43 countries in which Netflix aired the show.
    In many of the nations that believe Israel has no right to exist and routinely root for terrorists to slaughter Jews, a TV show that depicts Israeli covert operatives outsmarting and dispatching Arabs has an inexplicably loyal global audience.
    None of the cast members of "Fauda" were stereotypically Hollywood Handsome. It featured Jews straight out of central casting: balding, gruffly unshaven, plodding but surprisingly spry with Krav Maga.
    Its characters grapple with moral dilemmas and often find a way to spare the Arabs they target. Their enemies are referred to as "terrorists," not Muslims.
    The fact that "Fauda" continues to be so popular around the world, and yet global public opinion still seems to be rooting for terrorists, tells you everything you need to know about the twisted reality, moral inversions, and upside-down perversions that Israel faces in waging these wars against the traffickers in terror.
    News gets misreported. Casualties count for one side only. International law gets rewritten on the fly. Blatant lies - "genocide," "mass starvation," "apartheid" - are too beguiling to rebut.
    The world simply won't allow Israel to humanize the reasons for why it has always been forced to defend itself - even when a hit global TV show reveals the truth so graphically.


Israel Delivers Four SPYDER Air Defense Systems to Czech Republic - Anna Ahronheim (Jerusalem Post)
    The Czech Republic has received all four SPYDER air defense systems it purchased from Israel's Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, Defense Minister Jaromir Zuna announced, part of a 2021 agreement.
    The Czech Defense Ministry said the system is fully integrated into the NATO air defense alliance system.
    The system is designed to counter aircraft, helicopters, UAVs, and precision-guided munitions. It can engage multiple threats simultaneously up to 160 km. away in all weather conditions and its radar can track up to 500 targets simultaneously.
    SPYDER has been operational for 15 years and is used by Romania, the UAE, Morocco, India, the Philippines, Vietnam, and Singapore.

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News Resources - North America, Europe, and Asia:
  • U.S. Treasury Chief Says Iran Airlines to Be "Shut Down" on Sep. 23
    U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent warned Monday: "On September 23rd, all the Iranian airlines will be shut down around the world. And how do we do that? That if they land, you cannot provide them with fuel. You cannot provide them with landing services, you cannot sell them tickets, or you will be knocked out of the dollar system."  (CNBC)
        See also Iraq to Suspend U.S.-Sanctioned Iranian Airlines (Al Arabiya)
  • Why the Iran-Backed Houthis in Yemen and Saudi Arabia Are Back at War - Vivian Nereim
    The Iran-backed Houthi militia is now engaged in fierce clashes with Saudi-backed, Yemeni government forces on multiple fronts, and cross-border attacks in Yemen and Saudi Arabia have escalated.
        After a fragile truce in 2022, in July, the Houthis accused Saudi Arabia of bombing the airport in the capital, Sanaa, to prevent an Iranian plane from landing and they declared a naval blockade on Saudi shipping in the Red Sea. This obstructed a route that the Saudi government relied on to export oil after Iran stymied shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.
        "The Saudis have a growing kind of belief that peace with the Houthis is impossible," said Farea Al-Muslimi, a Yemen specialist at Chatham House in London. "They try to buy them, they try to bomb them, they try to fight them, they try to visit them, they try to invite them. None of this has worked."  (New York Times)
  • Britain to Support Saudi Arabia in Tackling Houthi Attacks - Ben Clatworthy
    Prime Minister Andy Burnham said Monday that an RAF plane would support "defensive" air-to-air refueling for Saudi strikes against Houthi fighters. He said it was in the UK interest to keep pipelines open so "we are playing our part."
        In the spring, the UK sent its Sky Sabre missile system to the kingdom to be integrated into Saudi and regional air defenses. (The Times-UK)
  • Trump Ramps Up Bid to Dismantle International Criminal Court - Matthew Dalton
    The Trump administration is preparing to impose sweeping sanctions on the International Criminal Court that would prohibit it from conducting transactions in U.S. dollars, according to U.S. officials and documents viewed by the Wall Street Journal. It was the arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in 2024 that destroyed the U.S. relationship with the court. (Wall Street Journal)
        See also below Commentary: The ICC Sacrificed Its Credibility to Target Israel - Lt.-Col. (res.) Maurice Hirsch (Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs)
News Resources - Israel and the Mideast:
  • Israeli Father of Six Killed in Palestinian Attack in Samaria - Emanuel Fabian
    Netanel Shukrun, 36, a father of six from Alei Zahav in Samaria, was killed on Sunday after immersing himself in a natural spring ahead of the Yom Kippur holiday. Hamas operative Kadri Samara, 37, opened fire from a vehicle, then got out of the car and fled on foot, still armed. Shortly after the attack, an IDF combat tracker opened fire on the gunman as he fled, injuring him. Hours later, IDF soldiers, following information provided by the Israel Security Agency, captured the terrorist at a hospital near Ramallah. (Times of Israel-Ynet News)
        See also Terror Victim Netanel Shukrun Laid to Rest - Idan Bloemhof (Ynet News)
  • IDF Kills 3 Hamas Operatives in Gaza including Two Oct. 7 Terrorists - Emanuel Fabian
    Two Hamas terrorists who invaded Israel on Oct. 7 - Yahya Hamdouna and Mohammad Rafa'i - and Basir al-Barsh, a commander in the Nukhba Force, were killed in recent strikes in Gaza, the IDF and Israel Security Agency said Sunday. (Times of Israel)
  • Israeli Sentenced to 4.5 Years for Spying for Iran - Eitan Glikman
    Israeli citizen Fares Abu al-Hija, 32, a resident of Kaukab in northern Israel, was sentenced to 4 1/2 years in prison Tuesday after he was convicted of spying for Iran. He was arrested outside the home of former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
        From October 2025 to January 2026, he was in contact with an Iranian agent via Telegram and carried out a series of tasks for him in exchange for payment totaling $3,600. He purchased and concealed mobile phones and a charger at several locations, activated the devices, installed communication apps on them, documented the hiding places, and sent the documentation to his handler. (Ynet News)
Global Commentary and Think-Tank Analysis:

    International Criminal Court

  • The ICC Sacrificed Its Credibility to Target Israel - Lt.-Col. (res.) Maurice Hirsch
    In its initial stages, Israel was one of the driving forces behind establishing the International Criminal Court (ICC). However, it soon became clear that the court had become irrevocably politicized and would be used as another weapon and forum of lawfare against the Jewish state. As a result, Israel, similar to the U.S., never joined the ICC.
        The non-existent "State of Palestine" did join the ICC in 2014. From the moment it was admitted, "Palestine" repeatedly and relentlessly urged the court to open investigations against Israeli servicemen and officials for crimes that were alleged to have been committed in "Palestine."
        The problem was that an independent "State of Palestine" never existed in the past, nor does it exist today. Thus, in the absence of any clear geographical area that could be called "Palestine," the ICC prosecutor asked the court to define the "the territorial scope of this jurisdiction."
        In practice, the ICC prosecutor was asking the court to make a decision not only to invent the non-existent "State of Palestine," but also to set its borders. The ICC decided, in direct contradiction of fact and law, that the "borders" of the new state were the Armistice Lines drawn in 1949.
        If the ICC accepts the U.S. position that precludes jurisdiction over officials from non-member states, it would have to accept the same argument concerning Israel. If the court accepts the claim that the U.S., a Western, law-abiding democracy, is both willing and able to investigate and prosecute potential offenders, it would have to accept the same claim with regard to Israel.
        Instead of targeting real offenders, the ICC is wasting its time, resources, and finances, pandering to the political whims of those who seek to punish law-abiding countries engaged, within the restrictions and limitations of international humanitarian law, in the war against terror.
        The writer, former director of the Military Prosecution in Judea and Samaria, is director of the Palestinian Authority Accountability Initiative at the Jerusalem Canter.  (Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs)


    • Israeli Security

  • Israel's Enemies Misjudged the Resilience of Israeli Society - Meir Ben Shabbat
    The assumption that Israel would collapse under three years of missile attacks has proved mistaken, according to a recent position paper published by Mada al-Carmel, the Arab Center for Applied Social Research, based in Haifa. It said Israel's Jewish public has demonstrated sustained resilience, broadly supports the continuation of military campaigns, and is willing to bear the human and economic costs because of a shared perception of an existential threat.
        Similar observations have been made by Dr. Abdel Moneim Said, chairman of the advisory board of the Egyptian Center for Strategic Studies, who highlighted conceptual failures that worked against Hamas leaders and Iran's "axis of resistance." The first was a misreading of the effect Israel's internal divisions would have on Israeli society. Instead, Israeli society came together and displayed a resilience that surprised decision-makers in Gaza and Tehran.
        Israel's war is not yet over, but victory will be unmistakable if it produces a change in the enemy's consciousness: a recognition that Israel cannot be defeated by force and that attempting to do so is not worthwhile.
        The writer, head of the Misgav Institute for National Security and Zionist Strategy, headed Israel's National Security Council (2017-2021) and served for 25 years in the Israel Security Agency. (Israel Hayom)


    • Israel and the West

  • Israel Derangement Syndrome - Kyle Smith
    When the subject turns to the Jewish state, formerly robust minds are turning to mayonnaise. Frontal autolobotomies are eagerly being carried out on every campus. Israel Derangement Syndrome (IDS) is a drug that gets you high on self-righteousness while disabling your cognitive faculties.
        In reviewing for Variety a movie called "NAZA," about the alleged depravities of the IDF, Jay Weissberg presented with an advanced case IDS, claiming: "The Israeli government has stocked its jails and morgues with Arab men in order to use them as bargaining chips in prisoner exchanges."
        Israel doesn't "stock its jails with Arab men" so it can "use them as bargaining chips." Israel is a liberal democracy with written law, due process, proper judicial procedure and carefully vetted judges - all the stuff that Hamas rather famously overlooks. Israel arrests terrorists and other criminals. If they're convicted, they go to prison. Israeli police don't cruise down the streets with tuna nets picking up random Arabs while exclaiming, "Caught another bargaining chip!"
        Call Israel a genocidaire, and you're violating what John Erskine called "the moral obligation to be intelligent." Israel's prosecution of the war Hamas started has resulted in around 24,000 combatant deaths among 73,000 war dead in Gaza. That's a civilian-to-warrior kill ratio of about 2 to 1. Women and children are among the innocents killed due to Hamas policy.
        No matter how many heart-rending pictures of war carnage appear, genocide means taking major steps toward wiping out a people. A 2 to 1 ratio ain't close to genocide. It isn't even genocide lite. It's tragic that Hamas operations guarantee the deaths of lots of civilians. But that's their way. They embed themselves among innocents, use hospitals as weapons depots, and skulk in a 400-mile network of tunnels. When you're pro-death, all of this comes naturally.
        An entity that launches a war has no moral right to complain when it faces a justified counterattack. Japan's response to losing a war it started wasn't to beg for sympathy, but to drop its death cult, join the ranks of liberal democracies, and cease attacking its neighbors. Gaza could move on from Hamas and do the same. (Wall Street Journal)
  • "Free Palestine" Has Become a Cult - Tom Slater
    Britain's most inoffensive, syrupy-sweet of musical exports, Ed Sheeran, was forced to open his show at Philadelphia's Lincoln Financial Field on Saturday with a pre-prepared statement: "I've tried in my career not to be a political commentator of any kind because I want my music and shows to be about unity, not division, about humanity, not politics."
        He called Oct. 7 "horrific" and name-checked Hamas's massacre at the Nova festival. Depressingly, many Western pop musicians seem not to see themselves, or their audiences, in the nearly 400 ravers who were butchered by jihadists in Israel that day. The keffiyeh classes are incandescent that Sheeran dared mention the Israeli victims at all, and that he refused to utter the magic words, "Free Palestine."
        This confirms that Palestinianism is now a cult masquerading as humanitarian concern for the people of Gaza. The insistence we mouth their slogans. The vitriol sprayed at anyone who deviates from the group's monomania.
        This is no longer about the right of Pally-mad artists to utter their "anti-Zionist" blather in public. This is about forcing the entire music industry to conform to their warped, Jew-baiting worldview, or else. Sheeran has been hounded not for saying something, but for not saying something - for asserting his right to stay out of politics and stick to the tunes. This is about conformity.
        The pro-Palestine cause took flight from reason some time ago. It is now fueled by sheer, blind hatred. Hatred of the Jewish state. Hatred of anyone who sticks up for it, or refuses to agree it should be wiped from the map. Hatred of Jews, if we're being honest, in many cases. What else could explain the viciousness, the eye-rolling when you dare bring up Hamas's murders and rapes?
        That even Ed Sheeran is being slurred as "complicit," as drenched in Palestinian blood, is almost darkly comic. This is a man who writes soppy love songs. We do not need to know what he thinks about the world's most intractable conflict, nor did he seem keen to tell us.
        The cult of Palestinianism might be growing, but there are millions more out there who can see through its bullying, its bigotry - who get that the conflict in the Middle East is, at the very least, a lot more complicated than their most annoying Facebook friend insists. (Spiked-UK)
Observations:

Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch: Unhinged, Obsessive Loathing of Israel Is Corrupting American Values - Luke Tress (Times of Israel)
  • Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, a leading voice in the U.S. Reform community, in his Yom Kippur sermon on Monday warned that hatred of Israel was corrupting the U.S.  Hirsch is senior rabbi of the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue in Manhattan.
  • "To be a Jew is to be part of a nation that others seek to harm. While pervasive anti-Jewish hostility is not new, it is new to us. We grew up in what has been described as the 'Golden Age' of American Jewry. It is this clear and obvious change that has so unnerved us."
  • "Jew-hatred is harming America. We are not only worried about ourselves. We are worried about the country we love. Unhinged and obsessive loathing of Israel is corrupting American values. If allowed to spread, it is not only Jews who will pay the price. America will too."
  • "We should continue to support causes that promote the general welfare of all Americans. But before you donate your time or financial resources, inquire, research and ask these agencies what are their views of Jews, Israel and October 7."
  • He called on younger Jews to assert themselves "on the field of ideas and values. You have the opportunity to be a great generation. Challenging times bring out strengths we never knew we had. Be heroic. Join the struggle. Do not sit it out. That is as good a definition of a hero as anything - a person who, when needed, cannot sit it out."
  • In an interview, Hirsch said that Israel is an American ally, part of the Western world and "confronting forces that seek to destroy the West. Israel is fighting the civilizational struggle of those who seek to break down Western civilization. Obsessive hatred and unhinged hatred - it's opposed to reason and pluralism, which form the heart of Western civilization."
Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs
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