Month: October 2025

DONATION SPARKS COMMUNAL CONTROVERSY

Divisions within South Africa’s Jewish community on Israel reflect global drivers.

By Marika Sboros

“At this moment, the heart of Israel beats as one with the hostages and their families.”

With these words, Israeli President Isaac Herzog took to social media on October 9, 2025 to welcome news of the ceasefire-hostage deal to end Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.

The heart of a vocal minority in South Africa’s Jewish community is not beating to quite the same unified rhythm.

Divisions among South African Jews have become yawning chasms since the terror attack by Hamas on October 7, 2023 that started the war. You’d have thought the gratuitous savagery on the day was enough to unify all Jews everywhere. It was not.

The brutality was preceded by a barrage of 3873 rockets from Gaza. What followed was an unprecedented orgy of violence that left more than 1200 dead, over 5000 injured and 250 kidnapped as hostages to Gaza – most of them civilians and not all of them Jews. The terrorists mass raped women and young girls; they tortured, beheaded, burnt alive and summarily executed whole families – men, women, children, babies, the elderly, and pet dogs.

Some called it a pogrom. UK historian Simon Sebag Montefiore compared it to:

“a medieval Mongol raid for mass slaughter and trophies.”

A UK-Israel parliamentary report called it “the largest single massacre of Jewish people since the Holocaust, the deadliest per capita terrorist attack, with just over 1 in every 10,000 Israelis killed, and the third overall deadliest terrorist attack in the world to date.”

October 7 brought the depth of divisions in South Africa’s Jewish community to the fore. The most recent red flag began waving publicly just days before Rosh Hashonah and Yom Kippur 2025.

It was the news report of a R1-million (about ILS188 910,60.00) donation by a South African Jewish family charity, the Mauerberger Foundation Fund (MFF), to Dr Imtiaz Sooliman, a medical doctor and founder-CEO of the globally renowned South African humanitarian charity, Gift of the Givers.

Out to Undermine Jewish State. Mauberberger Foundation presents donation to a man who supports South Africa’s case in The Hague against Israel saying “What’s going on in Palestine is a massacre. It’s not an alleged genocide; it’s a genocide; it’s straight and clear…”

R1-million is pocket change for the Mauerberger family. Its effects on the Jewish community were seismic, with aftershocks that continue.

The main driver of aftershocks?  Most Jews can’t fathom why members of a prominent, philanthropic, Jewish family would even think of donating to a charity run by one of South Africa’s most outspoken, implacable opponents of Israel. Sooliman has distinguished himself, if that’s quite the right word, with so many examples of conduct unbecoming of a humanitarian that they are too numerous to mention them all here.

Suffice to say he is known for inflammatory rhetoric, loathing of Zionists (the anti-Israel lobby’s code word for Jews), and spreading of antisemitic tropes. He believes that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza – and apartheid, ethnic cleansing, deliberate starvation and anything else he can think of to demonise the Jewish state.  He aligns with extremist Islamist jihadist forces that want to wipe Israel off the map. He speaks at anti-Israel protests beneath banners declaring “We are all Hamas”.

Sooliman regularly predicts Israel’s imminent demise.

This recipient of the MFF knows that accusing Zionists or any other Jews of genocide is the most provocative, inflammatory charge possible, as it weaponises the trauma of the Holocaust against its victims. Such rhetoric is not legitimate critique.

It erases the distinction between civilian casualties and intentional extermination. It distorts legal definitions and shifts blame in this war from Hamas, whose charter is explicitly genocidal against Jews. It is just another modern blood libel that effectively delegitimises Jewish suffering and fuels Jew-hatred conspiracy theories.

Genocide claims have targeted not just Israeli government policy. They have made the world a more dangerous place for Jews by normalising and undermining Jews’ right to speak out safely against existential threats.

But, back to the contentious MFF donation.

The MMF is headed by Dianna Yach, granddaughter of South African industrialist Morris Mauerberger, and a member of the University of Cape Town (UCT) Council. Mauerberger founded the MFF in 1936 as part of his philanthropic programme to support educational and community projects in South Africa and Israel that continue to this day. An early initiative was a clinic for Cape Flats workers who struggled to access state hospitals due to poverty and transport barriers.

Radical Redirection. What would the late Morris Mauerberger, one of South Africa’s leading industrialists and well-known Jewish philanthropist who through his Mauerberger Foundation that he established in 1936 and supported a multitude of causes in Israel mostly in education, have thought of his granddaughter donating to an organisation headed by a man who addresses anti-Israel protests beneath banners declaring “We are all Hamas”?

Since the 1960s, the MFF has supported a wide range of projects in Israel most notably at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In 1969, the Mauerberger family was directly involved in establishing Ben Gurion University of the Negev.

Yach has a reputation as a “proud UCT alumnus, passionately committed to equality, diversity, and human rights”. After graduating from UCT with a BA and LLB, she was admitted as an advocate to the High Court in South Africa, obtained an LLM from the University of London and subsequently lectured in law at Queen Mary College, University of London.

She serves on the boards of South African NGOs including ORT Cape SA and Cape Jewish Welfare Trust.

If Mauerberger were alive today, one wonders what he would make of his granddaughter’s MFF donation to Sooliman.

There’s no doubting what Sooliman makes of it.

He instantly spotted its myriad PR advantages, posting photos on social media of himself grinning broadly while accepting the donation from Yach. Another image captures him sitting with Yach in the intimacy of the lounge in her elegant Cape Town home.

He posted a statement by Khalid Sayed, African National Congress (ANC) Leader of the Opposition in the Western Cape Legislature, “saluting South African Jews like the MFF for their solidarity with Palestine”.

Sooliman is taking full advantage of the “halo” of moral righteousness that the donation from and association with Jews such as Yach hangs over his head. It may mitigate reputational damage from ongoing claims that Gift of the Givers is a conduit for funnelling funds to terror groups, not just Iran-backed Hamas and Palestine Islamic Jihad in Gaza, but Hezbollah in the West Bank as well.

The evidence for terror funding is circumstantial, but copious. As legal experts make clear, circumstantial evidence, presented properly and in sufficient quantity, easily secures conviction. Sooliman’s own words support it by implication, at times.

In an interview on YouTube, Sooliman declares that he does not follow local or international law, only Islamic law, and that no one can tell him what to do. He says of himself and Gift of the Givers that “we know how to move cash.”

Dubious Donation. Dianna Yach chairperson of the Mauerberger Foundation Fund (MFF), established in 1936, presents of R1-million to Dr Imtiaz Sooliman, who although being founder and CEO of the humanitarian charity, Gift of the Givers, also aligns with extremist Islamist jihadist forces and regularly predicts Israel’s imminent demise.

Sooliman vigorously denies claims of terror funding, while resolutely refusing to do the minimum required to put the claims to rest forever.

He won’t say who his funders are – except in this case, when the donors are Jews. He won’t say how much money Gift of the Givers receives in donations annually or where it all goes. Sooliman also won’t publish audited annual financial statements, as other international charities in South Africa routinely do.

Some South African Jews see the MFF donation as positive, even symbolic. They believe that Yach, however misguided, means it to bridge divisions between Muslims and Jews in South Africa.

Never was that more needed. Open hostility to Jews in South Africa is a top-down dynamic. UCT and the Western Cape province are hothouses of that hostility. It carries the African National Congress (ANC) government’s seal of approval for the “Palestinian cause”.

Most Jews I canvassed in South Africa and in the diaspora find the MFF donation deeply disturbing. They call it “disgusting”, “disgraceful”, a “betrayal”.  Most insisted on anonymity for fear of reprisals.

I emailed Yach for comment on the donation and another matter. She responded with a brief MFF statement and said she would not comment further and had handed my email to her lawyers.

According to a MFF statement, its directors “stand with Gift of the Givers in solidarity, giving their love for humanity and selfless work to address the urgent and pressing food and healthcare needs of the people of Gaza.” The donation is “…for children in Gaza, delivered within six months of fund receipt.”

The “ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza” has resulted in shortage of paediatric medicines, “with many health facilities destroyed and children facing preventable illness and mortality due to lack of access to vital treatment.”

The MFF saw Gift of the Givers as “uniquely positioned to address this urgent healthcare challenge, with an established track record of delivering lifesaving support to vulnerable communities across Africa and the Middle East since 1992.”

Yach’s brother, Dr Derek Yach, a US-based physician and epidemiologist, and fellow MFF director, was more engaging.

He said that the donation “aligns fully with MFF’s 70-year engagement with Israeli, Jewish and other commitments”. Its intent is “to provide humanitarian support to people in need, as (MFF) is doing with separate grants to Israeli mental health programmes.”

Pressed on why the family foundation chose Gift of the Givers, Dr. Yach explained that MFF directors considered its status as an approved non-profit organisation registered in the US; that it works with several faith-based charities (mainly Catholic); and has a “proven track record of getting medicines to those in need.”

Yet the donation is laden with ironies. Chief among them, the MFF is donating funds for medicines for Gazan children to the group that created the shortage of medicines in the first place. There’s also no guarantee that the medicines, by default or design, won’t end up in Hamas’s hands. Hamas, Gaza’s elected government, has a well-documented habit of embedding in hospitals, hijacking aid trucks and shooting to death hungry Gazans trying to access aid.

One critic who did speak openly via email was UCT emeritus professor of historical studies Milton Shain. Shain is author of Fascists, Fantasists and Fabricators: Antisemitism in South Africa from 1948 to the Present (Jacana Media, 2023), the final volume in his trilogy on South African antisemitism.

“One hesitates to criticise anyone giving support for the needy,” he said. The suffering in Gaza made it “obvious that support is needed.” Shain acknowledged Gift of the Givers as a successful global disaster-relief operation but noted that Yach “must surely know of Sooliman’s controversial statements about Israel,” and “…one needs to question (her) judgement.”

Another critic prepared to comment openly was Beulah Lange, a retired resident of McGregor, a village tucked away in the mountains of the Western Cape. Lange worked for more than 30 years in Jewish social welfare in Durban, 20 of those years as social worker and director of the then-titled Durban Jewish Welfare Association. She dealt regularly with trust-fund donations from Jewish philanthropists, including the MFF, which was “particularly generous to us.”

Lange was upset by the MFF donation to Sooliman, who she considers “virulently antisemitic.” She dismissed it as a “woke” attempt by those prepared to “bend over backwards to work with people who desire our demise.”

It does nothing, she said, to change her view of Sooliman and Gift of the Givers. 

Menacing Message. The recipient of the Mauerberger donation, Dr Imtiaz Sooliman on 5 October 2024, shared a platform under a banner proclaiming, “We are all Hamas” with known Islamist extremists and said, “…the Zionists were too clever…They run the world with fear. They control the world with money. And every time you say something, they terrify you and they say it’s antisemitic. But I’ve got a message for them. Find a new narrative, this one is dull, boring, and stupid.”

An earlier red flag of deep divisions in South Africa’s Jewish community was the so-called “Gaza resolutions” that the UCT Council passed in June 2024. These call for an academic boycott of Israel and reject the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism.

The fallout from their adoption was swift. Immediate and massive cuts in donor funding followed, spiralling potentially higher than R700-million, and not just from Jewish sources.

The Donald Gordon Foundation (DGF) withdrew a R200-million donation to a private hospital for UCT. A potential R400-500-million DGF donation to UCT was lost.

The HCI Foundation also withdrew its R15-million funding. The foundation is the corporate social investment wing of Hosken Consolidated Investments, the holding company of a black empowerment investment company that has its origins in the Southern African Clothing and Textile Workers Union.

Despite the deep funding cuts, there was surprising support for the UCT resolutions from Jewish academic and student ranks, including Yach and members of South African Jews for a Free Palestine (SAJFP).

SAJFP is closely allied to the global BDS (Boycott, Disinvestment, Sanctions) movement against Israel. SAJFP leader Jo Bluen uses inverted red triangles on her social media posts to celebrate the deaths of IDF soldiers in Gaza.

Yach’s lack of support (to put it mildly) for the lawsuit that Prof Adam Mendelsohn brought against UCT for passing the resolutions has also highlighted divisions.

Mendelsohn heads UCT’s Department of Historical Studies and is director of its Kaplan Centre of Jewish Studies. He has alleged in court papers that Yach (a member of UCT Council’s exco at the time) tried to pressure him to drop the case against UCT, using wording suggesting that his career and family were at risk.

Yach has vigorously denied the accusation in an answering affidavit.

Mendelsohn declined to comment on the MFF donation or his case against UCT, as it is still pending. However, I have it on reliable authority that evidence of exactly what Yach said, supports Mendelsohn’s claim.

David Benatar, a UCT emeritus professor of philosophy, has written extensively on the university’s fall from grace in recent years. He said that academics fear risking “the ire of UCT’s activist ideologues who believe that, of all the armies in the world, the only one to single out for boycott is Israel’s.”

Divisions in South Africa’s Jewish community could be simply a function of global drivers. These include “groupthink” and “adoption of submissive behaviours by Westerners who have already capitulated to Hamas and are mirroring the behaviour of Gazans,” as British US-based journalist Eve Barlow has suggested. It leads to “normalising the erasure of Jews from public life” by those who understand the “power, money and social mobility that comes from promoting the Hamas cause,” Barlow tweeted. This leads Jews on a path to “denouncing their own identity, nation and people,” essentially “willing their own deaths by sporting antizionism.”

Some Jews in South Africa are far down this path, as SAJFP and BDS members demonstrate.

Divisions among Jews in the wake of the MFF donation and UCT Gaza resolutions may contribute to the emergence of what Hannah Arendt once called the “conscious pariah”, and not just in South Africa.

Canadian anthropologist Adam Louis-Klein notes on social media that Arendt used the term to describe “the Jew who does not flee from non-Jewish society’s construction of them as heretical, outside, or even despicable, but embraces that position and uses it as a place from which to intervene in society.”

Thus, the conscious pariah Jew stands in contrast to the “parvenu, or exceptional Jew”, the antizionist Jew, who treats his or her Jewishness as “a gimmick or credential for the gentiles, while removing himself from the pulse of his people,” Louis-Klein says.

South Africa has some notable parvenu Jews, Jo Bluen and Ronnie Kasrils, former ANC MP and Intelligence Chief among them.

Kasrils celebrated October 7 in its immediate aftermath by calling it “a brilliant, spectacular guerilla warfare attack.” He continued: “They swept on them and they killed them and damn good. I was so pleased and people who support resistance applauded.”

It wasn’t only South African conscious pariah Jews who found his sentiments grotesque. The MFF, whether by default or design, risks locating itself firmly in the parvenu Jew camp. 

After October 7, I wrote a piece titled: Worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust not enough for some. I quoted US Jewish atheist neuroscientist philosopher Sam Harris saying that October 7 proves that we “are all living in Israel. Some of us just haven’t realised it yet.”

This still holds. After all, Hamas demonstrably does not discriminate when it comes to its genocidal intent.

Tel Aviv author and businessman Saul Sadka writes eloquently in the Jewish Chronicle that the Gaza deal is:

“…no ceasefire – it is Hamas’s near-total surrender.

Even if the jihadis won’t disarm, they have no meaningful ability to project power at Israel, only at its own long-suffering people.”

And yet, Sadka asserts:

 “…there is a genuine prospect for regional peace.”

I hope he’s right. And if regional peace comes, I hope it helps to heal at least some schisms in beleaguered Jewish communities globally.



About the writer:

Marika Sboros is a South African freelance investigative journalist with decades of experience writing fulltime for the country’s top media titles on a wide range of topics. She started her career as a hard-news reporter in the newsroom of the now defunct Rand Daily Mail, a campaigning anti-government newspaper during the worst excesses of the apartheid era. She commutes between South Africa and the UK.






While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves.  LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).

CAN WE BREATHE NOW?

A reflection during the agonizing interlude between deal signing and return of our hostages.

By Jonathan Feldstein

It feels premature to write about the deal that has reportedly been agreed to between Israel and Hamas with the US, Egypt, Qatar and possibly others as intermediaries. While any number of terms, clauses, and understandings could be breached and blow the whole thing up,  Israelis are praying, and waiting with baited breath after two long years of finding it hard to breathe.

Beginning of the End. “We’ve been suffocating for the past two years,” says Inbar Goldstein who was among the crowds celebrating in Hostages’ Square. Inbar, whose brother and niece were killed in the 7 October attacks and her sister-in-law, niece and two nephews taken hostage and released in November 2023, said that with the signing of the deal, it feels like “the beginning of the end.”

It’s important to note that this is NOT a peace deal. Anyone suggesting that it is, is wrong.  It is a deal that, at its best, will see the 48 remaining hostages held in captivity for 734 days being released, Hamas disemboweled, disarmed, and removed from control in Gaza, and a foundation for rebuilding Gaza. But it will not bring peace. It will not:

– change the hearts of two million Gazans who have been indoctrinated by extremist Islam for a century

– It will not put the baseless accusations of genocide and ethnic cleansing and war crimes by Israel back in the bottle. 

Those who seek to “Free Palestine” and eradicate Israel “from the river to the sea” will still seek to do so. To achieve actual peace, a radical change of heart is necessary.  Short of that, there is zero indication of any reform of Palestinian Arab society that accepts to finally live in peace with Israel.

Amid the rightful celebration, there is also widespread awareness of Hamas’ psychological terror that’s begun, is taking its toll, and which could lead to dashed hopes.

Israelis gather in Hostages Square to celebrate news of Gaza peace deal.

As optimistic and hopeful as many Israelis are, there is awareness that we cannot trust Hamas. There is a concern that even though the deal may say otherwise, not only will Hamas not disarm and ride off into the sunset quietly, there is a risk that the deal still leaves them in control, at least to be a spoiler, terrorizing Gazans and Israel for the foreseeable future.  If that is true, who will then actually be willing and able to take up arms against Hamas? Egypt? Jordan? The Saudis? Turkey? The Palestinian Authority (PA), EU, NATO, or USA?

With a deal signed, and defensive lines agreed to, will the world tolerate it if Israel is left alone, again, to have to take on Hamas in Gaza?

One of the reasons that this is not a peace deal is that even if removed from influence in Gaza, Hamas retains strong pockets of control and support in many “West Bank” Judea and Samaria villages and cities. Their control there is not being hindered, and for a certainty will not be something that they relinquish.  Rather, they will likely double down both to fight Israelis, and also against the PA control which they already successfully defeated in Gaza in 2007.

Hope for returning Home. “We’ll hope for the best,” said Alon Shirizly, sporting a red shirt that said, “Without them, home is gone.” A frequent attendee at rallies to free the hostages, Shirizly continued,  “We’re only at the beginning of a very long road. For the moment, there’s euphoria.” (Photo: Ben Sales/Times of Israel)

The “negotiators” AKA Hamas enablers Qatar, Iran, Turkey cannot be trusted.  The deal is not about them being reformed either. At best, they have been pressured to pressure Hamas for this immediate deal. They may derive some benefits from the Trump administration for serving this role, but they are the same extremist Islamic rejectionists that they were yesterday, and two years ago.

Israelis have suffered two unspeakable years of trauma from the initial attack and massacre and hostage taking – all war crimes by Hamas. Even though we may not always be able to articulate it, Israelis hope to be able to get to PTSD. Until now, we have been living in Present Trauma Stress Disorder. An end to the current combat and release of the hostages can begin to get us to Post Trauma, and eventual healing.  Until now we have not even been able to think about that.

Israelis celebrate the announcement of a deal to free all hostages, end the war in Gaza at Hostages Square in Tel Aviv on October 9, 2025 (Photo:  Sales/Times of Israel)

As events unfold on what will transpire in Gaza vis a vis the release of the hostages, a ceasefire, and Israeli withdrawal, it is also essential to look at internal issues, on both sides.

Hamas will try to spin this as a win. The terror-sponsoring countries that have harbored, protected and funded them – Iran, Qatar, and Turkey – are unlikely to reform their ways, much less save millions by throwing good money after bad that they invested to create the Hamas-terror machine to begin with. Perhaps, only severe US pressure, specifically considering that Qatar and Turkey are supposedly US allies might make a difference – but it is unclear if Trump will turn the screws on them to really put Hamas out of business, or reform themselves.

What is clear that without the massive military assault on Hamas leaders and terrorist infrastructure in Gaza, with the threat for much more, we would not even be having this conversation now. This includes Israel’s strikes against Hamas leaders in Tehran and Doha. While not the “complete victory” that Netanyahu promised, Hamas has been defeated. Unlike Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, they will try to retain and reconstitute their control.

It is also clear that their Islamic ideology has not been eradicated and will not go away.

In Israel, it’s likely that the current coalition government will fall. 

This is partly because Netanyahu is correctly accused of not taking responsibility for the failures that allowed the October 7 attack and massacre to begin with. Many Israelis recognize that even though he may also spin this as a win and even agree, the buck stops with him.

A Mother’s Joy. Einav Zangauker, mother of Israeli hostage Matan Zangauker, reacts to the announcement a hostage and ceasefire deal declared by Donald Trump.

Economically Israelis have only begun to feel the pinch in terms of the cost of this war, but we are far from realizing its full implication. While the shekel is at a three-year high against the dollar suggesting economic confidence, the cost of the war will rest on the shoulders of Israelis for some time. As that becomes more burdensome, there will be political consequences as well.

However, since elections were already going to take place in 2026, now it seems inevitable that at least some of the parties making up the current coalition will leave the government over disagreement with many of the deal’s terms, but also to distinguish themselves from other right and center-right parties and stake out their political turf among their voters, beginning to capitalize on the dissatisfaction, along with the 2026 campaign. 

Hopefully, whatever comes, as we hold our breath, maybe we will eventually be able to breathe again.



About the writer:

Jonathan Feldstein ­­­­- President of the US based non-profit Genesis123 Foundation whose mission is to build bridges between Jews and Christians – is a freelance writer whose articles appear in The Jerusalem Post, Times of Israel, Townhall, NorthJersey.com, Algemeiner Jornal, The Jewish Press, major Christian websites and more.





While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves.  LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).

THE ISRAEL BRIEF – 06 – 09 October 2025

06 October 2025 – An emotional edition of The Israel Brief as we prepare for the 2nd anniversary of 7 October and Greta gets deported.



08 October 2025 – Israel mourns 7 October and more on The Israel Brief.



09 October 2025 – They are coming home!!! What we know – details on The Israel Brief.



09 October 2025 – Rolene Marks speaks to Rob Schilling on WINA about Phase 1 of the ceasefire deal. 







While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves.  LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).

IT’S HUNTING SEASON AND JEWS ARE THE PREY

Reichman University’s Counter Terrorism Conference offered insights on identifying threats and emerging trends.

By David E. Kaplan

Attending the ICT25 Shabtai Shavit World Summit on Counter-Terrorism at Reichman University on September 18, two words were projected in bold on the Carol and Joey Low Lecture Hall screen during a 2-hour workshop titled:

GLOBAL TERRORISM: TRENDS and THREATS

The two words were ‘STOCHASTIC TERRORISM’.

Stochastic terrorism is an analytic description used in scholarship and counterterrorism to describe a mass-mediated process in which hostile public rhetoric, repeated and amplified across communication platforms, elevates the statistical risk of ideologically motivated violence by unknown individuals, even without direct coordination or explicit orders.

Every attendee at this World Summit understood the second word only too well for after all that is why they were there  and many of whom had travelled from across the world to attend – but I, like many I suspect, was clueless as to the meaning of the word preceding it – “Stochastic”. People clicked their cellphone cameras to record the screen’s image to later pursue further research indicating that I was far from alone in my ignorance. At the conclusion of the workshop following presentations by five panelists and a moderator – all academicians in the field of Counter-Terrorism – we were better informed.

Digital Dynamics. Identifying terror trends and the threats in the digital age.

We were also terrified!

Although now understanding the nature and scope of the beast – Stochastic Terrorism –  what we did not understand was how the ramifications of “this under-examined” yet “growing threat to public security” were to be addressed. At stake were the lives of Jews around the world!

I am writing this article following the news on the lethal single terrorist attack on the synagogue in Manchester and the first thing that came to mind in understanding the nature of this antisemitic atrocity was the Summit workshop and the two words – Stochastic Terrorism. While some in the UK were quick to respond that  “We were surprised,” they should not have been with antisemitic incidents  in the UK having increased by 113% since October 7, 2023.

Most people are generally familiar with the major terrorist organizations like ISIS and Al Quada, and closer to home for Israelis – Hezbollah, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ). All are identifiable; they have a comprehensible political structure led by high-profile leaders who are reported on in the media. These organizations have a chain of command where orders are given and executed by foot soldiers. But what of the increasing terrorist menace of the ‘lone wolf’, emerging fanatics who are not members of any terrorist organizations, receive no funding that could be traced and are neither inspired nor directly instructed by obvious terrorist leaders?  

Western democracies today face a growing threat from these lone wolf attackers like the Manchester synagogue terrorist  – Jihad Al-Shamie – who operate independently and act with little to no external support. As far as the Greater Manchester Police (GMP) knew, Al-Shamie, a 35-year-old British citizen of Syrian descent, did not appear to be known to counter-terrorism police.

Time Running Out. Members of the Jewish community gather at the St John’s Wood United Synagogue in north London, on April 7, 2024, for a ‘Time is Running Out’ event to raise awareness of the plight of hostages held by terror groups in Gaza. Is time also running out for British Jews who most believe they no longer have a long-term future in the UK ? (Photo: Justin Tallis/ AFP)

A Mr. Haliwell, a nearby 72-year-old neighbor of the terrorist’s family home, said the property used to be on his window-cleaning round and he knew the wider family “a little,” saying they were “really nice people…..I was astonished, I was shocked,” and recalled the synagogue attacker in his younger days as someone whose name he did not know but “…was just a straightforward, ordinary lad, nothing would stand out to make you think he was ….”

According to the March 2025 GLOBAL TERRORISM INDEX, 93% of fatal terrorist attacks in the West over the last five years have been carried out by ‘lone wolf’ actors.

How are they radicalized and driven to commit mass murder? 

Apparently easy in this “Radicalization in the Digital Age”, another of the World Summit on Counter Terrorism’s presentations,  where the sources of lethal influence are often virtually untouchable – they might not even be aware of the dangerous impact they are having. Instead of charismatic terrorist leaders or imams in mosques, the wannabe terrorist or prospective ‘lone wolf’ could be inspired or malevolently motivated by:

– TV news network personalities

– professors and intellectuals at prestigious universities and think tanks

– movie stars, fashion models and rockstars

– politicians and even respected statesmen.

All the above, whether they are aware or not of the lethal influence and impact they have, enjoy protection or  “plausible deniability” because of their respected positions.

After all, who could accuse the following:

  • Ireland’s Dáil Éireann passing a motion stating that “genocide is being perpetrated before our eyes by Israel in Gaza“.
  • Italy’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani  saying that, while Israel has targeted civilians during the war in Gaza, “genocide is something else”
  • Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong   saying that “Israel will be judged in the international courts”, implying genocide
  • Brazil’s President Lula da Silva   condemning Israel’s actions as genocide, saying: “What’s happening in the Gaza Strip with the Palestinian people hasn’t happened at any other moment in history. Actually, it has happened: when Hitler decided to kill the Jews.”
  • Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney seemingly agreeing with a protester who said there was “a genocide happening in Palestine”
  • Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez  calling Israel a “genocidal state” 
  • Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin accusing Israel of carrying out a “massacre” in Gaza marking one of the harshest criticisms to date from the Holy See and a sharp deviation from an institution known for its cautious and diplomatic tone.

All these public utterances by these respected world leaders can be understood within the definition of Stochastic Terrorism, which is “the public demonization of a group or individual”,  such as today, Israelis or Jews,  “through mass communication, which incites statistically probable but individually unpredictable violent acts against the target.” 

Since October 7, 2023, Jews have been the “target” of these “unpredictable violent acts” across North America, the UK and Europe.

The rhetoric as defined by “Stochastic Terrorism” is “often indirect, vague, or uses coded language, allowing the instigator to plausibly disclaim responsibility for the resulting lone wolf acts of violence.” If people are hearing from their political leaders and popular news networks or reading on protest banners and placards that Israelis – and by association Jews – are perpetrating “genocide”, then Jews become in the general public’s mindset a legitimate target for vilification, ridicule, ostracization, vandalism, harassment, hate speech, social exclusion and physical assault. For some, they become a target for extermination and these ‘some’ may emerge as ‘lone wolf’ actors. Who can then say who directly was responsible for their racialization towards extremism – the Spanish or Canadian prime misters or the Vatican?

In May 2025, the man who shot dead outside the city’s Jewish Museum Yaron Lishinsky and Sarah Milgram, a couple employed at the Israeli Embassy in Washington, did not belong to any terrorist organization. So too the 45-year-old Egyptian national who threw flammable liquid and Molotov cocktails at participants in a weekly rally calling for the release of Israeli hostages in Boulder, when 82-year-old Karen Diamond was killed and eight others injured.

Blood on the Sidewalk. Cleaning blood off the ground the day after two Israeli embassy staffers were killed near the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington. Noting how difficult it is to stop radicalized lone wolf attacks, one expert said that identifying who will go from anger to violence is like “trying to find which piece of hay is going to become a needle.” (Photo: Evelyn Hockstein / Reuters)

One of the most disturbing aspects of modern ‘lone wolf’ terrorism is the rapid speed at which radicalization occurs. A report compiled by CAM’s Antisemitism Research Center (ARC) in partnership with the social media analytics firm Cyabra, reveals that in 2002, it took “an average of 16 months for an individual to move from exposure to extremist material to executing an attack.” By 2015, this period had shrunk by over 40%. Today, in some cases, radicalization happens in mere weeks. 

As described by leading scholars, ‘stochas­tic terrorism’ involves “the use of mass media to provoke random acts of ideolog­i­cally motivated violence that are statistically predictable but individually unpre­dict­able.” (The age of lone wolf terrorism. Columbia University Press).

The concept highlights how persistent, hostile political rhetoric – as is occurring every day and all day against Israel –  can increase the likelihood of ideological violence against Jews anywhere in the world. Jews living in cities across the globe once considered “safe zones” are now revaluating their futures. For British Jews, the Manchester synagogue attack was a wake-up call. Across the UK in the now post-Manchester era, Jews will be feeling vulnerable, exposed and targets for antisemitic extremism. Rabbi, physician  and a former member of the community who today lives in Israel Jonathan Lieberman writes in The Jerusalem Post (Oct.6,2025):

 “Enough is enough. We will take our brains, our assets, our businesses and our children to a place where synagogues are not on the front line, where being openly Jewish is not a life-risking activity.”

Message from Manchester. Is this the future for those being “openly Jewish” in the UK – constant police protection? (Photo: London News Pictures)

How can it be that in the UK, a country globally respected as a beacon of democracy that celebrates diversity,  Lieberman asks, “Maybe Britain wants its Jews to leave, I don’t know.”

What Jews do know that wherever they are during this crazed hyped-up antisemitic post-October 7 era, if they are “being openly Jewish” they are potential moving targets.

“Israel in the Eye of the Global Storm”. The writer at the Shabtai Shavit World Summit on Counter-Terrorism at Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel.










While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves.  LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).

Lay of the Land Weekly Newsletter- 05 October 2025

Unveiling the contours and contrasts of an ever-changing Middle East landscape Reliable reportage and insightful commentary on the Middle East by seasoned journalists from the region and beyond.

Home

Like this content? Please share and tweet it to your friends and followers.

To subscribe via email please send a mail noting your request to: layotland@gmail.com 
Please visit/ join/follow our social media platforms:

Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/LotLSite/

X (Twitter): Lay Of The Land – @layoftheland5

Also available on YouTube @The Israel Brief  – Simply click on the red subscribe button to receive alerts when a new report is posted.



What’s happening in Israel today? See from every Monday – Thursday LOTL’s The Israel Brief broadcasts and on our Facebook page and YouTube by seasoned TV & radio broadcaster, Rolene Marks familiar to Chai FM listeners in South Africa and millions of American listeners to the News/Talk/Sports radio station WINA, broadcasting out of Virginia, USA.

THE ISRAEL BRIEF – 29 September – 01 October 2025
(Click on the blue title)



HONORING SECOND ANNIVERSARY OF OCTOBER 7, 2023

Marking this Tuesday, the 7th October, 2025, two years since the October 7 massacre of 2023, when Hamas launched a massacre in southern Israel that resulted in approximately 1,200 – mostly civilians – murdered, 250 taken hostage and others injured, traumatized, sexually assaulted and displaced, Lay of the Land remembers and honors the victims and heroes and the many across the nation who were called up or volunteered to defend their families, friends, neighbors, and the country. We remember, we grieve, we mourn and we advocate for the return of the hostages.

Lay of the Land’s Photo-Pick of the week

DECISIVE DAYS

Approaching the 2nd anniversary of the Oct. 7, 2023 massacre, mass public display of support in Israel for President Trump’s end-of-war plan and to bring “Our Hostages Home – NOW”

Rapturous Response. Israelis respond rapturously to Donald Trump’s plan presented on September 29th to end the war in Gaza. In a first opinion poll, 72% said they supported it, only 8% opposed with 20% undecided. The deal was also greeted
by rises in the Tel Aviv stock exchange and the shekel. (Photo: Reuters).




ARTICLES

Please note there is a facility to comment beneath each article should you wish to express an opinion on the subject addressed.

(1)

THE GENOCIDE HOAX

A football match exposes the Gazan charade of false accusations against Israel.
By David E. Kaplan

Switching Channels. It was an Egyptian soccer match that more interested Gazans than
following on TV the major White House peace plan announcement that would impact
their future and stop the alleged “genocide”.

THE GENOCIDE HOAX
(Click on the blue title)




(2)

‘LITTLE’ RED RIDING HOOD AND THE WEST’S ‘BIG’ BETRAYAL

Ignoring the message of the famed fable, the West welcomes the predator that will satiate its appetite on the unsuspecting gullible.
By Grant Gochin

Divine Destinations. Supplanting the approaching red bus as emblematic of London,
this bus stop reflects the city’s cultural metamorphosis and the direction
the UK is moving in.

‘LITTLE’ RED RIDING HOOD AND THE WEST’S ‘BIG’ BETRAYAL
(Click on the blue title)



(3)

PILAY REPORT ON GAZA – GOLDSTONE REDUX

We’ve seen it all before!
By Lawrence Nowosenetz

From Goldstone to Pillay. SA judge, Richard Goldstone (l) seen here with Nivi Pillay retracted
significant allegations in the 2009 UN Goldstone Report that he headed and that had
accused Israel of crimes against humanity. Will the same befall the Pillay report?

PILAY REPORT ON GAZA – GOLDSTONE REDUX
(Click on the blue title)



LOTL Cofounders David E. Kaplan (Editor), Rolene Marks and Yair Chelouche

To unsubscribe, please reply to layotland@gmail.com






While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves.  LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).

THE ISRAEL BRIEF – 29 September – 01 October 2025

29 September 2025 – Are we close to the end of the war? and more on the Israel Brief.




30 September 2025 – The Trump Peace plan – what we know – all on The Israel Brief.



01 October 2025 – A stormy Israeli summary as Roro goes on a raid on Greta and the “ceasefire” men and more on The Israel Brief.






While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves.  LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).

THE GENOCIDE HOAX

A football match exposes the Gazan charade of false accusations against Israel.

By David E. Kaplan

Wait a minute. Nearly every news bulletin on Al Jazeera, Iran’s English TV news network called PressTV, Turkey’s English TV news network TRT WORLD and those keeping up the rear with calculated venom, FRANCE24, RT (Russia Today) and Ireland’s RTÉ, have every day and all day for months on end covered Gazan news alleging a “genocide” perpetrated by the “Zionists” – read Jews. Newsreaders, commentators and an assortment of selected experts have daily presented this “genocide” as if they were reading the daily weather report. While few ever question announcements of daily climatic temperatures, even less question that Israel was actually committing a “genocide”.  If the experts say so and confirmed by the UN,  it must be so.

And then BREAKING NEWS:

“We watched soccer instead”

This was a leading headline pertaining to Gazan citizens that despite the so-called “genocide” they were enduring according to the media – opted instead of watching the White House press conference relating to the end of the war, and thus end the alleged “genocide”, to watch soccer instead. This was not just another  ho-hum “deal” but one that Israel had already signed off on , which meant removing its forces from Gaza and most significant that every Arab country in the region, including Qatar, had endorsed. This gave it the added gravitas that no earlier deals had.

You would expect that those enduring a “genocide”, particularly the ‘pots and plates brigade’ projecting starvation for the cameras would show some interest. Clearly, watching a football match was far more appealing!

Switching Channels. It was an Egyptian soccer match that more interested Gazans than following on TV the major White House peace plan announcement.

MORE INTERESTED IN A SCORE THAN WHAT LAY IN STORE

This would be some strange and unique type of “genocide” where those supposedly effected are more interested in watching a soccer match than discovering how their “genocide” might be brought to an end!

The Ynet report revealed that while many of the so-called “genocide” sufferers across Gaza “ignored the announcement entirely” others were preoccupied with more important matters – like watching football! 

Clearly, the US president did not consider the timing of his announcement of the plan to end the war that has been going on “ thousands of years”, Trump’s language, that it coincided with “a big Egyptian soccer match,” as related by Suleiman, a resident of the Gazan city of Deir al-Balah. According to Suleiman, “anyone with a TV,” in Gaza, “chose instead to watch the football match.”   You would think IF there was a genuine genocide in progress, the people suffering would be more interested to learn of their future fate than watching a football match on TV!

Ending The War. President Trump Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu at the White House press conference announcing the 21-peace plan that has been accepted by Israel and endorsed by world leaders as well as all the major Arab countries.

Clearly not and because of one clear fact. While the situation in Gaza is terrible as it is during all wars – that is the nature of war – it is NOT a “genocide”. The word “genocide” is a part of the enemy’s arsenal in the nature of this war when victory is determining not only by winning on a battlefield, territory but winning the story. It is a question always of whose narrative will prevail on the TV news networks and social media? There is no Gaza “genocide” and this is why  there are factions withing the Palestinian camp as well as TV networks like Iran’s PressTV advising Hamas to reject the deal, in other words to allow  the alleged “genocide” to continue.

While much of the world has charged Israel with restricting aid and Israel has counter-charged the U.N. with incompetence and bias and Hamas with stealing aid to finance terrorism, the Trump proposal approved by the Arab countries is very clear in addressing the immediate concerns pertaining to the people of Gaza’s welfare:

 “…upon acceptance of this agreement, full aid will be immediately sent into the Gaza Strip … including rehabilitation of infrastructure (water, electricity, sewage), rehabilitation of hospitals and bakeries, [and] entry of necessary equipment to remove rubble and open roads.”

‘Will Blow Up…’: Hamas Allies Reject Trump’s 20-Point Gaza Deal; ‘Israeli Formula Against…’

With Israel accepting Trump’s peace plan, if Hamas, who are the elected leadership of Gaza rejects it or vacillates, it will expose what was always a hoax: that Israel was committing a genocide.





While the mission of Lay of the Land (LotL) is to provide a wide and diverse perspective of affairs in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by its various writers are not necessarily ones of the owners and management of LOTL but of the writers themselves.  LotL endeavours to the best of its ability to credit the use of all known photographs to the photographer and/or owner of such photographs (0&EO).