| DAILY ALERT |
Tuesday, August 25, 2026 |
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News Resources - North America, Europe, and Asia:
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Monday announced a new campaign to isolate the Iranian regime. He said "Operation Economic Outcast" has "mapped every node, every facilitator and every network that Iran has used to smuggle oil and evade sanctions." (Wall Street Journal) See also Treasury Launches Campaign Against Iranian Regime on Economic D-Day Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent said Monday: "We are launching an economic onslaught against Iran's financial connections around the globe. Our objective is to sever every economic lifeline that sustains this tyrannical regime until Tehran stands alone." "America is no longer managing the Iranian threat. We are ending it. Those who stand with the United States will reap the rewards of our partnership. Those who tether themselves to Tehran should expect to share in the isolation of a withering regime." "Any entity that facilitates money laundering or sanctions evasion on behalf of Iran risks being cut off from the U.S. financial system. Today's announcement also expands secondary sanctions exposure for those who continue doing business with the Iranian regime and will accelerate the pace of U.S. enforcement." (U.S. Treasury Department) See also State Department Sanctions Target Iran's Military Procurement and Oil Traders (U.S. State Department) News Resources - Israel and the Mideast:
Israel's Mossad chief Roman Gofman and Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani met on Sunday in Jordan to defuse tensions after Israel's strike last week on a Syrian airbase. They discussed establishing "a special operations room" in Jordan under U.S. supervision to prevent any confrontation in Syria, including involving Turkey, AFP reported. Israel's Channel 12 reported that the meeting was positive and was considered a step toward restarting direct Jerusalem-Damascus negotiations. An Israeli security source said Jerusalem has set a number of red lines for such talks, including not allowing any Turkish military activity in Syria; keeping the Syrian side of the Golan Heights a demilitarized zone; not allowing the Syrian army to possess strategic weapons; ensuring the security of Syria's Druze community; and only withdrawing Israeli troops from the buffer zone in Syria in exchange for diplomatic achievements. Channel 12 also reported Sunday that Israel has recently identified an increase in Hizbullah's attempts to smuggle weapons from Syria into Lebanon. While the Syrian and Lebanese armies have publicized several weapons seizures over recent months, an Israeli security official said: "We assess that many shipments are getting through without being detected." (Times of Israel) "[Hamas] interferes with humanitarian operations, exploits civilian infrastructure, influences distribution mechanisms, and continues its repeated attempts to smuggle prohibited items under the guise of humanitarian aid," a senior official from the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) said Sunday. Since the beginning of the ceasefire in Gaza in October, the IDF has continued to facilitate the entry of humanitarian aid and goods into Gaza in coordination with the UN and international organizations. COGAT says the volume of aid entering Gaza significantly exceeds humanitarian needs as defined by UN agencies. More than two million tons of food have entered Gaza since the ceasefire, including meat, poultry, eggs, dairy products, fruits, and vegetables. 600 trucks enter Gaza every day, with 70-80% carrying food. More than 70,000 cubic meters of water are supplied each day, equivalent to 60 liters per person per day. Four water pipelines are operational in Gaza, three of which supply water from Israel. Advanced medical equipment has been transferred into Gaza, including X-ray machines, generators, and oxygen tanks. Ten permanent hospitals, 12 field hospitals, and four medical centers are operating regularly. (Jerusalem Post) See also Hamas Trying to Smuggle Drugs into Gaza via World Central Kitchen Aid Packages - Emanuel Fabian Israeli authorities say World Central Kitchen "responsibly reported a smuggling attempt detected inside humanitarian aid supplies. During food preparation in their kitchen, illegal drugs were found concealed inside canned pepper packages, including 6 packs of hashish [and] unidentified illicit substances," probably captagon, an amphetamine-type stimulant. (Times of Israel) The IDF destroyed two Hamas weapons depots on Monday which were located inside mosques in Gaza City and Deir al-Balah, where Hamas had stored dozens of assault rifles and other weapons. "This is another example of Hamas's systematic exploitation of civilian infrastructure, including mosques, in violation of international law, to advance and execute terror attacks against IDF troops and Israeli civilians," the IDF said. Ahead of the strikes, the IDF warned Palestinians residing in the area to evacuate. (Times of Israel) U.S. special envoy to Syria and Iraq Tom Barrack told AP on Sunday, "United States policy on the Golan was set by President Trump in 2019 and is unchanged." This contradicted his claim in an interview on Friday that Israel occupies the Golan Heights: "They still occupy the Golan against the UN resolutions, against all of the international order, which has said the Golan is Syria's." (Jerusalem Post) IDF documentation soldiers took part in international rescue missions to Colombia and Venezuela following powerful earthquakes. They captured not only rescue and engineering operations, but also the human drama and encounters between IDF soldiers and local civilians. "Our photographs are also meant for the families back home," said Sgt. H. "These soldiers left home in mid-August to save lives on the other side of the world. The photographs show their loved ones the magnitude of what they are doing." (Ynet News) An ancient burial cave was discovered beneath a building by Border Police officers operating in the Silwan neighborhood of eastern Jerusalem, the Israel Police announced on Monday. The Israel Antiquities Authority said the burials date back to the Second Temple period (516 BCE to 70 CE). Other archaeological artifacts were also found within the cave. The discovery came after a police investigation into a violent clash between two feuding families. (Jerusalem Post) Global Commentary and Think-Tank Analysis:
Iran After six months of on-again, off-again bombing in Iran, punctuated by futile efforts to negotiate a grand bargain with the regime, President Donald Trump is returning to the more defensible strategy of economic containment. The Trump administration has decided to squeeze the mullahs by cutting them off from the rest of the world. On Monday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent threatened secondary sanctions on foreign individuals, corporations and financial institutions that continue to do business with Tehran. Even if the administration succeeds in sharply constricting Iranian exports, Trump needs to be realistic about what this can accomplish. Ratcheting up pressure appears extremely unlikely to compel the hard-liners of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to surrender. Sanctions have a poor record when it comes to hastening regime change. Comprehensive enforcement is elusive, and Iran is a practiced evader. The immediate goal of a policy of containment is to make an already battered Iran weaker so that it's less capable of threatening its neighbors and developing nuclear weapons. As the vise tightens, Tehran's new leaders will probably lash out militarily. Trump will need to respond forcefully to such attacks. (Washington Post) President Trump has returned to maximum economic pressure to force Tehran to open the Strait of Hormuz and agree to a resolution on the nuclear issue. The shift is also an admission of the limits of military force in subduing Tehran. Yet, despite appearances, this is the wisest move available. The Iranian regime is more extreme than ever, but also weaker than ever. The regime in its current form will never surrender. Tehran can withstand an external threat, but the internal threat is the one it truly fears. Iran is suffering simultaneously from recession, extreme inflation, wage erosion, job losses, and a collapse in oil exports, its most important source of revenue. The writer served as head of the Hizbullah and Lebanon Branch of Israeli Defense Intelligence (IDI) and senior advisor to the director of IDI, where he was centrally involved in Israel's campaigns against Hizbullah and Iran. (Israel Hayom) President Donald Trump is now trying to break Iran's regime with the "single greatest financial offensive ever marshalled against an adversary," in the words of U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. The U.S. navy is currently mounting a total blockade of Iran's ports, designed to sever the regime's financial lifeline. At the same time, American warships are guiding tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, hugging the coast of Oman. Although they were still running the gauntlet of regular Iranian drone attacks, ships carrying about five million barrels of oil transited the strait every day in July, according to Windward, a maritime intelligence company. Since then, the number making it through seems to have risen. The crucial point is that America has, for the moment, succeeded in wrecking a highly successful Iranian strategy, whereby the Islamic Republic would export its own oil safely while closing the strait to everyone else. Having exhausted every alternative, Trump has at last embarked on a ruthlessly effective strategy with a chance of delivering. (Telegraph-UK) Israeli Security Israel remains small in both territory and population compared to most of its Middle Eastern rivals, and despite its economic prosperity, its resources remain limited. Its long-term survival cannot be taken for granted. Israel must therefore maintain constant readiness for armed conflict and for the battle over its legitimacy. Any state must align its goals with the resources at its disposal and avoid overreach. Unlike a great power, a small state cannot set the rules of the international system or significantly shape its regional environment. David Ben-Gurion, Israel's first prime minister, understood that military power alone could not compel Israel's neighbors to make peace. Israel could build an "iron wall" (a concept coined by his political rival Ze'ev Jabotinsky) that would thwart its neighbors' plans to destroy it, in the hope that over time, the states of the region would come to accept it. The military achievements against Hamas in Gaza and Hizbullah in Lebanon, the establishment of security zones in Syria and in Lebanon, and the attacks on Iran's nuclear and missile infrastructure in 2025 and 2026 have undoubtedly improved Israel's security situation and regional standing. Israel demonstrated exceptional military and intelligence capabilities and exacted a heavy price from its enemies. Yet military victories are time-bound in their political effects, and the motivation to challenge Israel's existence has remained persistently high. There is limited basis for assuming that even severe military defeat necessarily erodes an adversary's willingness to pursue long-term strategic objectives. The main assumption behind Israel's national strategy should remain, regrettably, that the Middle East does not change quickly. The region remains a source of religious extremism, terrorism, and nuclear proliferation. Israel continues to lack legitimacy in much of the Arab and Muslim worlds. Israel's improved regional standing resulted from recognition of Israeli military power rather than from a fundamental shift in public attitudes. Israel cannot subdue Iran, a nation of 90 million people led by an Islamic clerical elite that is relatively insensitive to the costs of sustained confrontation. Israel can, however, significantly degrade Iran's capacity to inflict harm upon it. Hamas and Hizbullah also cannot be decisively defeated so long as they retain substantial popular support and continue to receive state backing for military development and funding. Israel has not succeeded in disarming Hamas in Judea and Samaria, where it has maintained military control since 1967. These organizations can be weakened, and their operational capabilities significantly reduced, but they cannot be fully eliminated as long as they retain mass domestic support and receive substantial external assistance. When no attainable political solution is in sight, the most realistic goal becomes the denial of enemy capabilities and objectives. Israeli military operations are designed precisely to prevent the other side from achieving its strategic aims. The writer, former head of JISS (2017-2025), heads the program on Strategy, Diplomacy, and National Security at Shalem College. (Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security) Turkey "Turkey understood the message and stopped the move - but it is unclear for how long," a senior Israeli official said Monday, a week after an Israeli airstrike on the Abu al-Duhur airbase near Idlib in Syria. After diplomatic efforts failed to prevent Ankara's attempt to establish a presence in the area, which he described as a "red line," the decision to strike was made with the full backing of the military echelon. The official said Ankara sought "real and significant things that must not be there," because they could restrict Israel's freedom of action and create a precedent for such a Turkish presence in Syria. He stressed that Israel cannot allow the new Syria to build military capabilities that could endanger it. (Ynet News) Turkey has steadily cemented its military and diplomatic footprint in Syria, operating under Israel's watchful gaze. There is a sweeping Turkish initiative to funnel an endless stream of military hardware into Syria and cement its influence there. The collapse of the Assad regime created a vacuum in Syria that Turkey eagerly filled. Erdogan is forging an immense military machine armed with strategic capabilities and cutting-edge technology. The lessons of Oct. 7 dictate that adversaries must be judged by their capabilities, not their perceived intentions. Turkey's strategic alliances, industrial base, and economic prowess easily dwarf those of Iran. (Israel Hayom) A source in western Syria said Turkey's footprint in the region has grown significantly more pronounced, particularly in the port cities of Latakia and Tartus. "Officials representing Turkish intelligence and the Turkish military are playing in Syria as if it were their private playground," the Syrian source revealed. "This manifests in Turkish vehicles - some of which are armored - that soldiers are using to move around on the roads." Syrian agents have been brokering real estate deals in the residential districts of the two cities on behalf of Turkish businessmen. Footage broadcast in July 2026 by the Qatari network Al-Araby revealed a convoy of Turkish military trucks and armored vehicles advancing toward Deir ez-Zor in eastern Syria. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that Turkish forces have actively fortified their footprint, surrounding bases with concrete blast walls, defensive trenches, and earthen berms. Turkish National Defense Ministry Spokesman Zeki Akturk announced on July 16 that Turkish Naval Forces commander Ercument Tathoglu had visited Latakia alongside a flotilla of warships, the first time Turkish naval vessels had docked there in 15 years. (Israel Hayom) History has never documented a genocide carried out by shipping in medicine and running mass vaccination campaigns for the population supposedly being "annihilated." Nor has it ever recorded a genocide carried out by building humanitarian zones or feeding the "exterminated" population in active combat areas with hundreds of thousands of tons of water, food, and medical supplies every single day, all while setting up field hospitals. Israel poured enormous resources into evacuating Gazan residents from their homes in combat zones before the ground offensive even began, using millions of leaflets, text messages, and phone calls to warn them. None of that will spoil the blood libel Erdogan has cultivated against Israel for three years running, including the push for an arrest warrant against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The world doesn't hear nearly enough about the Turkish president who has turned his own country into a dark police state that has investigated or prosecuted more than 700,000 of its own citizens since 2016. Amnesty International and the UN's Middle East committee have published detailed reports documenting torture inside Turkish detention facilities. Add to that the extensive testimony published by the UN Human Rights Office documenting war crimes and ethnic cleansing that Turkey and the militias it backs have carried out in Kurdish residential areas. (Israel Hayom) Israel and the West There is literally no moral line within their pathological anti-Zionist campaign that the Guardian won't cross. An Aug. 4 report by Julian Borger legitimizes the latest propaganda by Amman about the al-Aqsa Mosque being in danger. It uses "stormed" and "incursion" to describe peaceful Jewish visits to the Temple Mount compound, terms typically used by Palestinian Authority-controlled and terrorist-friendly "news" sites to convey the dangerous lie that Jews are interlopers at the site and that the mosque is in danger. The writer is UK Media Research Manager at CAMERA. (Jewish Chronicle-UK) See also The "Al-Aqsa Is in Danger" Libel: The History of a Lie - Nadav Shragai (Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs, 2012) Muslim-Jewish Relations I am an Arab Muslim and have spent years advocating for peace and reconciliation between Muslims and Jews. I have never understood why acknowledging the ancient Jewish connection to this land should be considered threatening to Muslims. The Dead Sea Scrolls are one example that demolishes the claim that Jewish attachment to the land is a recent political invention created by Europeans in the 19th or 20th centuries. The ancient manuscripts found in caves near the Dead Sea were written by Jews living in this region more than 2,000 years ago. I do not see something that belongs to a civilization completely foreign to me. I see part of the religious and historical landscape from which Christianity emerged and which Islam itself repeatedly acknowledges. This is why I believe Muslims should be among the last people to deny ancient Jewish history. The Quran is filled with the history of the Children of Israel. Moses is mentioned more frequently in the Quran than any other prophet. The Quran speaks of King David, Solomon, Aaron, Joseph and the tribes of Israel. It acknowledges the Torah and repeatedly places its own religious message in conversation with earlier Jewish and Christian traditions. There is therefore something deeply strange, in my view, about some Muslims feeling that we must erase Jewish history in order to defend Arab or Palestinian rights. Peace will never be built by creating historical amnesia. For decades, political arguments surrounding Israel have frequently attempted to deny Jewish history altogether, pretending that a nation did not exist on its ancestral homeland. The Dead Sea Scrolls tell us that Jewish communities lived in this land, developed religious institutions in this land, and debated the meaning of their faith in this land centuries before Islam appeared and centuries before modern European nationalism existed. History cannot become something we recognize only when it supports our political position. If archaeology proves something uncomfortable, we should not destroy the archaeology. We should adjust our understanding. For Muslims in particular, recognizing the Jewish people's ancient connection to this land should not frighten us. It does not diminish Islam. It simply requires intellectual honesty. The writer is a senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute in Ottawa. (Fox News) Observations: The Penchant for Blaming Israel and Jews for Everything - Amb. Alan Baker (Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs)
The writer, former Legal Adviser and Deputy Director-General of Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, heads the international law program at the Jerusalem Center. |
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