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ON THE WAY TO GAZA

Repeated visits reveal fresh insights, revelations and questions.

By Jonathan Feldstein

On the way to the Gaza border, my friend asked how many times I had been there since the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack and massacre.

I had to think about it.

I remember the first trip vividly. Several other trips were outstanding whether visiting soldiers and bringing supplies or preparing and providing food, one on one like the time with my friend Marziyeh (Marzi) Amirizadeh and seeing the devastation through the eyes of a woman who suffered the evil hatred of radical Islam growing up and living in Iran and identifying the evil we faced with the evil that she lived under for most of her life, or planning for and implementing our incredible Root & Branch program bringing Christian volunteers to harvest olives in Israel and along the Gaza border.

There were other trips with friends and donors, as well as relatives, media and more. In the car, I estimated that I had visited the Gaza border at least 30 times. In retrospect it’s probably more. Surely averaging once a month. Considering my travels, that’s a lot.

Some trips blur together. Some are memorable for different reasons. All are emotionally draining. Yesterday was no different. It had been a while since the last time.

Horrific Legacy. High school students from across Israel were visiting the sights where the massacre and killings took place three years earlier. (Photo: Jonathan Feldstein)

Along the roads from Routes 34, 232, 25 and more, I noticed the increased number of memorials along the side of the road. From once piles of stones with flags and photographs these have been “developed” to permanent and thoughtful memorials. In America and other countries, you see similar respectful homage where people have died in car accidents. The roads here have been repaved and show no signs of what happened that day anymore. But I remember the countless points where one would drive and see large dark spots on the road with a slight bump as you drove over them, burn marks from the high temperature flames where cars were set on fire. Torched with people inside.

Graveyard of Vehicles. A young school student engages at the Car Wall memorial near moshav Tkuma in Israel’s Gaza Envelope where over 1,500 burned, twisted, and bullet-riddled vehicles are stacked into the shape of a wall.  With each damaged ‘shell’ representing lives lost, the memorial functions as an educational and remembrance site for visitors, families, and delegations. (Photo: Jonathan Feldstein)

The roads no longer have the scars but the memorials along the side of the roads show the points where hundreds of people were shot and burned to death, their bodies and their cars littering the roads.

I looked at the piles of the shot up and burnt remains of the vehicles from that day. More than 1000 cars, many of which became death traps for their passengers. As we visited the site that also has been built up as a permanent memorial, first I noticed dozens of tour buses. Most were for Israelis for whom the site has become a pilgrimage. People wanting to see, understand, bear witness to the horrors of that day.

Murderers on Motorbikes. A piled heap of burnt motorcycles used by Hamas terrorists during the assault is displayed alongside the victims’ vehicles as physical testimony of the attack. (Photo: Jonathan Feldstein)

There are few tourists in Israel now so most of the guides and survivors telling stories of what happened that day were speaking Hebrew. What broke my heart, other than the memorial itself, was the prevalence of young people. It’s terrible that we must educate our children about this all and it’s part of the legacy we leave them. It’s not new but it is still sad. Many high school students. Some of whom got to practice their English in a spontaneous conversation with Marzi about her life and imprisonment in Iran. She connected the dots of the Islamic Republic and Hamas as the same evil. That we have the same enemy. That the Iranian people are not the regime that hijacked Iran 47 years ago and that the people support Israel.

Three years ago, they were early adolescence and three years from now they will all be serving in the army defending their country. I wondered if in 7 or 10 or 15 years, my own grandson’s will be part of this pilgrimage.

I saw a group of soldiers. Three years earlier they were the age of the high school students we encountered. They stood there with weapons over their shoulders, against the backdrop of piles of dozens of burnt remains of just some of the cars. Their weapons are used to defend us against the evil that perpetrated the crimes that we witnessed with the cars just as one reminder, listening to things they surely remember from three years ago when they were just students and Israel was at its most vulnerable.

Burden of Defense. Responsible for protecting Israel today, young IDF male and female soldiers at the Car Wall memorial, who were school students when the massacre occurred in October, 2023. (Photo: Jonathan Feldstein)

At the site of the Nova Music Festival where some 25% of the 1200 people killed that day were slaughtered, the memorials have become uniform and standardized, albeit with personal touches from the loved ones of those who were killed and mutilated there that day. I always describe it as a cross between Woodstock and Auschwitz. We spent nearly an hour there, but what’s really needed to understand the enormity and the scope of the loss is much more, even if you’ve been there multiple times before as I have.

Dance to Death. The site of the dance floor at the Nova Music Festival massacre where, Hamas terrorists raped, mutilated, beheaded, burnt, slaughtered and shot 364 of the attendees, party staff, police security, and medical service personnel. (Photo: Jonathan Feldstein)

In Sderot, we visited the powerful memorial at the site of the former police station in which all the police on duty that morning were killed and many others on the street. As hard as it is to think, amid the slaughter there was incredible heroism and it was a miracle that more people were not killed there that day. Of course, that’s no comfort for the survivors whose loved ones are no longer with us.

Poignant Pillars. ‘Pillars of Eternity’, the memorial built on the ruins of the original Sderot police station destroyed by heavily armed killer Hamas squads. The memorial features 18 tall, eleven-to-twelve-meter columns representing the fallen police officers and defenders, integrated with Hebrew letters symbolizing hope and energy. (Photo: Jonathan Feldstein)

I told the story of the Suisa family, the young parents, Odaya and Dolev, who were trying to flee Sderot in their car and were caught in an ambush and murdered in front of their two young daughters, leaving them orphans. It must be noted that the person who sacrificed his life trying to save the family was a Bedouin Arab, Amer Odeh Abu Sabila. A construction worker who was in Sderot early that fateful Saturday morning, Amer heard Odaya screaming after Dolev had been killed and got into the driver’s seat to try and bring Odaya and her two young daughters to safety at the Sderot police station. Not knowing that the police station had already been overrun by the terrorists, both Abu Sabila and Odaya were murdered, while the two kids, Romi, 6, and Lia, 3, lay on the floor of the car unscathed. There is harrowing video footage from that day that shows the two young girls screaming for help as police officers arrived.

Brutally Murdered. Odaya (33) and Dolev Swissa (34) who were murdered in front of their two daughters. The family tried to leave Sderot as sirens sounded but were attacked by Hamas terrorists and killed in their car.

Amer Odeh Abu Sabila’s story is not unique as many Israeli Arabs were killed that day, including a police officer inside the police station, but is important to recount as it reveals the reality of life in Israel of Arabs who tragically died alongside their fellow Jewish citizens.

Sacrificed his Life. Bedouin construction worker, Amer Abu Sabila (25), lost his life as he bravely attempted to rescue Dolev and Odaya Swisa’s two daughters near the police station in Sderot.

As the sun was setting, we made our way to one of the lookout points from which Gaza is visible. Despite international claims to the contrary, even with the naked eye one can see entire cities still standing. And even three years and a week after the inhuman Hamas attack and massacre, there was a jarring audible punctuation of the reality as we heard gunfire in the distance coming from inside Gaza, indicating that if these killers are not fought and pushed back, they will rise and try to attack us again and again.

The numbers alone do not sufficiently represent the enormity of the day. Each of the 1200 people, including Jewish and Arab Moslem and Druze Israelis, as well as many foreigners including Christians, is the loss of an entire universe for them and their loved ones. But there’s a national story as well, timeless in the sense that it’s an unfortunate part of the reality of Jewish history and the foreseeable future.

“The Day the Music Died”. Photo memorials of each of the murdered party-goers at the Nova Music Festival. (Photo: Jonathan Feldstein)

However many times I have gone to visit these sites, each time thinking that there’s nothing particularly new in doing so other than bringing people who have not yet witnessed it, I am sadly shocked at how there’s still so much to absorb and process and how such experiences are necessary.



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 Journal, 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).

NAVI PILLAY AND THE HEDGEHOG TRAP

Why the Nobel Peace Prize sacrificed genuine peacebuilding for ideological reductionism and anti-Israel bias.

By Yoram Blumstein

By rewarding a rabid anti-Israel activist-jurist and chief peddler of baseless “genocide” and “apartheid” claims against the Jewish state with the prestigious Peace Prize, the Oslo Committee did not recognise peace – but weaponised lawfare and institutional bias against the Jewish people and Israel. The Nobel Committee, which lacks a moral compass, forms part of a coterie of ignoble institutions that espouse systematic animus towards the Jewish state and provide a fertile ecosystem for the normalisation of antisemitism.  Israel and the United States (U.S.) rightfully rejected the decision to award the coveted Peace Prize to Navi Pillay, a South African ad hoc judge at the compromised International Court of Justice (ICJ) and former jurist on the International Criminal Court (ICC), as it is an affront to the Jewish people and rewards Hamas and Israel’s enemies. Conversely, the feckless South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, France, Iran, United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, and Hamas praised the award as a victory for international justice.

Hands-on Hatred. Navi Pillay addressing the Nuremberg Forum in Nuremberg on 9 October 2026 following the announcement that she will be awarded the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize has kept her hands on the ball on promoting anti-Israel bias. (Photo: Daniel Karmann/ Getty Images)

Fundamentally, the Oslo Committee (which bears sole responsibility for awarding the Peace Prize) betrayed Alfred Nobel’s (a genius, polyglot, and inventor of dynamite) stated conditions (as enshrined in his last will), which required the recipient to meet specific criteria for advancing international diplomacy, peace, and dialogue. Pillaydid not meet Alfred Nobel’s essential requirements to be elevated to the pantheon of great peacemakers such as Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, F.W. De Klerk, Henry Kissinger, Shimon Peres, Yitzhak Rabin, Menachem Begin, Anwar Sadat and Elie Wiesel, amongst others, and is an affront to the Jewish people.

ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK

In his 1953 essay, “The Hedgehog and the Fox”, the British Jewish philosopher Sir Isaiah Berlin asserted that:

 “…the fox knows many things, while the hedgehog knows one big thing.”

Berlin borrowed the line from the ancient Greek poet, Archilochus. Berlin’s dichotomy can serve as a heuristic tool to expose confirmation bias and as a stark warning against singular, dogmatic thinking.  Metaphorically, hedgehogs are monists who reduce reality to a single, central vision or organising principle. By contrast, foxes are pluralists who relentlessly pursue different avenues, nuances, variety, and complexity without forcing everything into a rigid, singular vision. Berlin used the distinction to analyse Leo Tolstoy’s inherent personal contradictions, whom the British philosopher diagnosed as a “fox by nature”, but a “hedgehog by conviction”. Tolstoy, a cerebral writer, foresaw the infinite complexity of life, but he desperately tried to force it into a “grand singular theory of life.” In Berlin’s philosophical dichotomy, a hedgehog-like approach is not inherently bad, but political scientists like Philip E. Tetlock have repurposed the “fox-and-hedgehog” framework to warn analysts and policymakers against overconfidence, single-cause grand perspectives, and confirmation bias in expert forecasting.

THE NOBEL PEACE COMMITT’S HEDGEHOG TRAP

The Nobel Peace Committee’s diabolical decision fits the hedgehog diagnosis. The decision is inextricably linked to the current torrent of violent antisemitism and anti-Israel bias. It carefully reduced the criteria for the prize to a singular grand vision (as a purported fact), while filtering out complex realities about:

– the Israel-Palestine conflict

– the normalisation of antisemitism, and

– the role of terror networks such as Hamas and Lebanese Hezbollah.

Politicizing a Prize. Would Alfred Nobel view the 2026 Nobel Peace prize to South African jurist Navi Pillay as a faithful fulfillment of his will or a weaponization of the award to legitimize anti-Israel hatred and prejudice?

Before the prize announcement, Pillay prodigiously used the label “genocide” and “apartheid state” to describe Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. She supports the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement and endorsed the UN Durban Anti-Racism Process, which set the tone for a notable uptick in modern antisemitism and institutional bias. In addition, she failed the neutrality test as an international jurist when she signed a joint letter accusing Israel of “domination and oppression” before heading the UN Commission of Inquiry into the Occupied Palestinian Territories. In September 2025, the UN Independent Commission of Inquiry, chaired by Pillay, released a report concluding that Israel had committed “genocide” in Gaza. However, the ICJ has yet to rule on South Africa’s baseless accusations. The report took statements from individual Israeli senior officials out of context and recommended criminal prosecution for senior Israeli officials at the ICC. Pillay and the bodies she represents are structurally biased against Israel and the Jewish people. Even when the Oslo Committee notified her of the award, she continued to accuse Israel of “genocide”:

“The last thing I did was the report on Gaza naming what’s happening in there as genocide…Why would you need courage to speak the truth? You interpret the law. You look at all the facts, so it’s an impartial decision.”

Check your facts at the door, Pillay:

Your reporting shows no impartiality; your statements and opinions are steeped in tendentiousness. You are an ingloriously useful idiot!

Pillay was visibly surprised when she was announced as the 2026 recipient, as other deserving nominees, such as U.S. President Donald Trump, played a pivotal role in negotiating a ceasefire in Gaza, spearheaded peace talks between Israel and Lebanon, and agitated for a modus vivendi between Israel and Syria. Geopolitical optics do matter. Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories, continues to use her office to frame Israel’s actions in Gaza and Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) as “genocidal” while failing to acknowledge Israel’s defensive policies against a genocidal terrorist entity.  The September 2026 United Nations General Assembly debates focused almost exclusively on Israel. The United Kingdom’s recent import ban on “settlement” goods, sanctions frameworks, and arms export restrictions align with European and Western nations (such as Ireland, Spain, the Netherlands, and France) in restricting trade with Israel following meritless advisory opinions from international legal institutions like the ICJ. In a different, yet crucial context, on October 4th, the Green Party of England and Wales adopted a preposterous policy at its annual conference, formally equating Zionism with racism. While the Green Party is a fringe party with a few parliamentary seats, the decision carries significant political and diplomatic weight. It will further galvanise the normalisation of antisemitism in Europe and beyond. On October 17th, during a local elections campaign rally in Rylands (Cape Town), a predominantly Muslim and Hamas-loving suburb, Ramaphosa emphasised South Africa’s ongoing genocide case against Israel and the African National Congress’ (ANC) steadfast support for the Palestinian cause. It is perplexing why a head of state would use a misguided foreign policy issue to attract Muslim voters when the focus should be on fixing service delivery failures in ANC-led municipalities.

Based on the above, the Nobel Committee fits the hedgehog framework with a singular, misguided vision. By betraying Alfred Nobel’s explicit wishes, the Oslo Committee has succumbed to the prevailing cosmos (which is dominated by narratives munificently bandied about by the “New Antisemites” – a violent neophyte species of state and non-state actors) that demonises and delegitimises the State of Israel. Hence, the said Committee has failed to uphold impartiality in awarding the peace prize to an individual whose career has been fixated on spreading disinformation about Israel. Regrettably, the Oslo Committee is afflicted with a growing pathology of institutional bias, as highlighted by incessant anti-Israel resolutions and declarations by the UN and its allied institutions.

Institutionalizing Antisemitism. Far from promoting peace and international law, the Committee’s selection of Navi Pillay exposes the double standards and deep-rooted hostility toward the Jewish state within international institutions.

A FOXLIKE COUNTERARGUMENT

Lamentably, the Nobel Committee exposed its bias in awarding the prestigious prize to Pillay by failing to consider:

– the prevailing facts on the ground

– alternative or contrarian perspectives

– Israel’s right to self-defense, and

– Pillay’s track record of vehement anti-Israel rhetoric.

These factors are inconsistent with the qualities of a peacemaker, which Pillay lacks. The facts speak for themselves. A fox would have determined that Israel did not commit genocide or war crimes, cause mass starvation in Gaza, or deliberately kill babies and civilians. In fact, Israel took reasonable measures, which are well-documented, to comply with laws of armed conflict and international humanitarian conventions.

The real danger lies in ideological monism, when international institutions (like the Oslo Nobel Committee) gravitate toward “hedgehog thinking” and compromise their role as neutral arbiters. By awarding the Peace Prize to Pillay, the Nobel Committee acted as the sole, supreme arbiter of peace, and the decision was biased, predetermined and influenced by the anti-Israel zeitgeist and extremist voices. The Nobel Committee’s decision is consequently alarming, as it facilitates the normalisation of antisemitism, which is disturbing to Jews as violent antisemitism sweeps across Western capitals.

Pillay is not a peacemaker and unworthy of the Nobel Peace Prize. She should have declined the award as she had not done enough to comply with Alfred Nobel’s wishes. The key state instigator of unfounded genocide allegations against Israel, South Africa, was the first to congratulate Pillay on her undeserved prize. Yet, the ANC’s reckless decision to take Israel to the ICJ provided the building blocks for antisemitism to thrive. Ambassador Rabbi Yehuda Kaploun, the U.S. Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism, remarked in early October that South Africa’s ICJ genocide case against Israel led to an exponential increase in antisemitism and anti-Israel hostility.

Under the Shadow of Nobel. Ambassador Rabbi Yehuda Kaploun, the US Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism asserts that South Africa’s decision to make its ICJ case against Israel a centerpiece of its foreign policy is contributing to global antisemitism.



About the writer:
Editor’s Note: Yoram Blumstein is a nom de plume the author uses to protect their identity because of previous security threats.





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 – 18 October 2026

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THE ISRAEL BRIEF – 12-15 October 2026
(Click on the blue title)



Lay of the Land’s ‘Photo Pick’ of the Week

ISRAEL’S ELECTION FEVER

Captured on a local TV news network poster, the look on all three faces captures concern, whether for themselves or the country

As Israel prepares to head to the polls on October 27, 2026, for the first election since the October 7, 2023 attacks, the nation is experiencing a high-stakes campaign that functions as a literal referendum on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. With a nation still in trauma and deeply divided, is it to be – a political stalemate or a time for change?



ARTICLES

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

(1)

REMEMBERING RAB

Jewish survivors of the Rab concentration camp form battalion to fight the Nazi German forces occupying Yugoslavia.
By Michel Levine

Rab Revival.  Not to forget the heroic past, French historian recalls the formation of the ‘Jewish Rab Battalion’ (above) on the Adriatic island of Rab following their liberation from the Italians in September 1943 and then went on to fight the Nazis, where a 100 fell in combat.

REMEMBERING RAB
(Click on the blue title)



(2)

A HOUSE DIVIDED CANNOT STAND

America needs to confront its unsustainable debt problem that is threatening to collapse the economy of the world.
By  Neville Berman

Debt Clock Ticking. A bus shelter on Independence Avenue, Washington DC where an electronic billboard on August 30, 2026 displays the current U.S. National debt at 40 trillion dollars. How long before it plunges not only the US but the world into a depression?

A HOUSE DIVIDED CANNOT STAND
(Click on the blue title)



(3)

THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE OFFENSIVE

Hardly in pursuance of “peace” when an Islamist death cult applauds the announcement of the 2026 South African winner.
By Craig Snoyman

Humanitarian or Political? Awarding the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize to former U.N. human rights chief Navi Pillay following her longstanding anti-Israel bias and defending antisemitic rhetoric, does raise serious ethical and legal questions.

THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE OFFENSIVE
(Click on the blue title)



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

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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 NOBEL PEACE PRIZE OFFENSIVE

Hardly in pursuance of “peace” when an Islamist death cult applauds the announcement of the 2026 South African winner.

By Craig Snoyman

On 9 October 2026, the Norwegian Nobel Committee (“the committee”) awarded the Nobel Peace Prize to Navanethem (Navi) Pillay for:

– her efforts to promote peace and international law”,

and announced that:

– “Peace requires justice”.

Humanitarian or Political? The decision to award the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize to former U.N. human rights chief Navi Pillay sparked fierce backlash from U.N. watchdogs for her longstanding anti-Israel bias and defending antisemitic rhetoric. (Photo: Fabrice Coffrini/AFP via Getty Image)

In Nuremberg, ironically, Pillay told a crowd celebrating her award: “The last thing I did is the delivery of the report on Gaza, naming what’s happening there as genocide.” In Oslo the committee said that it was “not taking a stance” on genocide, as “it’s her report”. Perhaps the committee should have made its announcement on 7 October, the day of the worst genocide of Jews since the Second World War, rather than two days later.

On 9 October 2009, seventeen years earlier to the day, the committee awarded the Nobel Peace Prize to President Barack Obama “for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples”. Obama’s response, as his memoir records, was a question: “For what?” In 2015 the committee’s secretary disclosed that the committee chose Obama because it believed the prize would help him achieve his goals.

The will of Alfred Nobel’s will is quite clear what the requirements for the Peace Prize are. It is for those who, “during the preceding year”, have “conferred the greatest benefit to mankind”. It is for the person who has done “the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses”.

The records of the favoured candidates were clear. Vanessa Nakate campaigned for the vulnerable communities affected by climate change. The volunteers of Sudan’s Emergency Response Rooms were bringing food, medical help and evacuation to civilians in Sudan’s civil war. Yulia Navalnaya became the political voice of her husband, Alexei Navalny, who died in a Russian Arctic prison colony.

Pillay’s record was not as impressive. Having signed South African  BDS petition to “Sanction Apartheid Israel” she had no qualms in chairing the singularly inappropriately named “Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel”  She proceeded to conduct an investigation in which Israel refused the commission entry and the commission acquired its information from second-hand sources.

Ten weeks after she tendered her resignation, the commission published its results and conclusions, finding that the State of Israel was responsible for committing genocide, for failing to prevent it and for failing to punish it. In September 2024, it had recorded that  Hamas was  guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity. In its 2025 report to the General Assembly it absolved Hamas, mentioning it once, in a quotation from an Israeli minister. It declared that Israel had the intent to destroy the Palestinians of Gaza, as this was “the only reasonable inference”. It traced that intent back to “decades of unlawful occupation and unlawful settlement, with racial segregation or apartheid”. When asked whether the states that still supplied arms to Israel were complicit in genocide, Pillay answered: “Yes.”

Jaundiced Judgment. And how did judge Navi Pilay (center) react when fellow UN Human Rights Council’s Commission of Inquiry into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict member, Miloon Kothari  (right) expressed that social media was “controlled largely by the Jewish lobby,” she defended him saying he had been “deliberately decontextualized.” (Photo: Luke Tress/Times of Israel)

Her record as a judge at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (“the tribunal”) is equally chequered. When the defence in the Media case applied for Pillay’s recusal, because she had already expressly pronounced on the guilt of the radio station RTLM in an earlier case, the chamber in which she sat dismissed the application. When a press report accused three judges of the tribunal of laughing while defence counsel cross-examined a rape survivor about how her attackers had undressed her, Pillay, as president of the tribunal, called the report “a mischaracterisation of the scene”, and in the same statement declared that it would not be appropriate for her to discuss the conduct of other judges in an ongoing trial. The survivors’ organisations Ibuka and Avega suspended their cooperation with the tribunal.

Her attitude has remained constant. When her fellow commissioner, Miloon Kothari, told an interviewer that the “Jewish lobby” largely controlled social media, Pillay stated that he had been “deliberately misquoted”, without saying how. Kothari subsequently apologised and wrote that it had been “completely wrong” for him to describe social media in that way. Pillay was not as forthcoming.

In the Rwanda tribunal, the Appeals Chamber annulled and replaced various decisions over which Pillay presided, because of her misdirection concerning conduct outside the tribunal’s temporal jurisdiction. In the Palestine commission matter it was easier. Her commission was to investigate violations “leading up to and since 13 April 2021” and was not limited by time issues. During the investigation, Pillay stated: “The occupation is as non-ending as our mandate.” This followed earlier prejudicial remarks, when Pillay told the General Assembly that “Israel’s occupation is now unlawful”. The evidence of her bias, and her (lack of) regard for natural justice, did not prevent her from sitting on either the tribunal or the commission.

The Appeals Chamber in the Rwanda tribunal reversed Pillay’s Media case decision on the basis that a reasonable trier of fact could not find conspiracy to commit genocide to be “the only reasonable inference” from the evidence. Pillay, not a great historian, repeated her conclusion when deciding on Israel’s conduct, with a greater paucity of evidence. But then, a report to the UN General Assembly has no Appeals Chamber above it that can set aside such a legal conclusion.

In September 2022, when the United Nations Association of Germany proposed to present her with its Otto Hahn Peace Medal, Ron Prosor, Israel’s ambassador in Berlin said:

“To have Navi Pillay investigate Israel is like asking Putin to chair a commission of inquiry into Ukraine.”

Proser on Pilay. “To have Navi Pillay investigate Israel is like asking Putin to chair a commission of inquiry into Ukraine,” said Ron Prosor, Israel’s Ambassador to Germany Ron Prosor. as Ambassador to the UN (courtesy)

The ceremony did not take place. In November 2025, when Sydney gave her its peace prize, the Premier of New South Wales declined to attend, and the Executive Council of Australian Jewry had said that the prize went to recipients “for having the ‘correct’ opinions, rather than for making a real contribution to peace.”

The Nobel committee wanted Obama to achieve in 2009, and it paid him in advance. In 2026 it wants Pillay’s report to achieve the definition of Gaza as genocide before any court has ruled, and it has paid her in advance as well. She is well positioned to pay it back, as she sits as an ad hoc judge in the Gambia v Myanmar genocide case and will no doubt work hard to change the definition of genocide.

The function of the Nobel Peace Prize committee was to ask what Pillay did in the preceding year for fraternity between nations, and what she did for fewer standing armies and for peace congresses. She ticks none of those boxes. She incites friction and animosity. She accused one nation of genocide and called the nations that arm it complicit. Nobody punished the committee for the Obama Peace Prize, and now the committee has taken another step further. It is no longer an award for anticipated fraternity; it is now an advance to persuade political opinion. Again, the committee goes unpunished. But this time the sin is more egregious. A political finding on genocide lets the committee ignore its own principles, and lets its members’ antipathy toward Israel translate the big lie of Israeli genocide into a Nobel medal.

Pilay’s Prize. By awarding to a recipient with an agenda of endangering Jews worldwide, has the Nobel Peace Prize -one of the five original Nobel Prizes established by the will of Alfred Nobel – been irreparably tarnished?

So, to you Ms Nakate, to you, the volunteers of Sudan’s Emergency Response Rooms, and to you Ms Navalnaya: speaking for the vulnerable, feeding civilians under fire or defying the Kremlin will not win you this prize. Better luck next year. President Obama asked “For what?”

The committee has now answered: the correct opinion, not peace.



About the writer:

Craig Snoyman is a practicing Advocate in Johannesburg.





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 – 12-15 October 2026

12 October 2026 – President Herzog to award FlyDubai hero pilot highest honour, US military generals reject genocide accusation and more on The Israel Brief.


13 October 2026 – School trip ends tragically and security scare regarding a Delta flight – your top stories on The Israel Brief.



14 October 2026 – We told you so, UK, France, Canada and Australia! Who is suing Bibi and more on The Israel Brief.



15 October 2026 (1) – Sderot police station memorial on the Israel Brief.



15 October 2026 (2) – Danny from kibbutz Beeri shares his story 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).

A HOUSE DIVIDED CANNOT STAND

America needs to confront its unsustainable debt problem that is threatening to collapse the economy of the world.

By  Neville Berman

In 1858 Abraham Lincoln gave his famous speech in which he stated “a house divided cannot stand.” At the time the issue was slavery. Fast forward 168 years, and the prophecy of Lincoln is very pertinent today.

Today there are approximately 8.4 billion people in the world, of which approximately 342 million live in the United States of America. Statistically less than 4.2% of the world’s population live in the United States. Clearly American influence across the world is out of all proportion to its population size. America is a technological, financial and military powerhouse unmatched by any other country. The annual American gross domestic product is by far the largest in the world.  America is clearly the greatest creative, inventive, progressive, and influential society in history. It has more intellectual property and patents than any other country. American innovation and daring put a man on the moon. The American way of life has lifted millions of people out of poverty to personal prosperity.  

The Second World War ended in 1945 with the unconditional surrender of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. The revelations of the horrors of the Holocaust, shocked the world. With Europe in ruins, the world was facing a pivotal moment that would determine the future of Western civilization.  US president, Harry Truman introduced a policy the likes of which the world had never seen before. It was called the Marshall Plan. Under the plan, the victorious Americans offered to pay for the cost of rebuilding West Germany, the very country that had just waged war against America, and to pay for the resuscitation of countries in Europe that were devastated by the war. It did the same for Japan. No reparations for damages were demanded from any of the defeated parties. When the Soviet Union attempted to starve West Berlin into submission, America flew 189, 000 flights that carried 2.3 million tons of aid into West Berlin. The airlift started in June 1948 and lasted for 15 months. It saved the people of West Berlin. America became the indispensable superpower whose generosity and foresight ushered in decades of prosperity to the world. No burden was too great for America. 

Tractors on Track. The U.S.-sponsored Marshall Plan (April 1948–December 1951) was designed to rehabilitate the economies of 17 western and southern European countries in order to create stable conditions in which democratic institutions could survive. (Photo: US National Archives)

After the end of the Second World War, America and their previous ally, the Soviet Union, began what was called the “Cold War.” In order to oppose the spread of communism, America got involved in wars of choice in Korea and in Vietnam. Following the attack on America on 9/11, America decided to retaliate by waging a war against terrorism by attacking both Iraq and Afghanistan. America is now involved in a costly war against Iran. All the above wars were initially seen as justified and in America’s interest. However, all of the above inflicted an enormous cost on America in terms of blood and treasure. Americans have now grown tired of paying the price of forever wars in far off countries.  

America is the greatest consumer society in history. Slick advertising and promotions, coupled with easy credit, resulted in a demand for products and services that in many cases are neither needed nor affordable. Garages across America are filled with items that were hardly used. Millions of people are now maxed out on credit, and live from day to day. Materialism has created a society living in debt. A loss of income for even a short period can be catastrophic for millions of ordinary working-class Americans. Bank foreclosures on home mortgages are increasing. Tens of thousands of people are homeless. Millions have insufficient savings for their retirement. Capitalism made America great, but poverty still persists. Americans used to envisage a better future for their children. For millions of Americans, this no longer seems to be the case.  

The demand for illicit drugs in America is staggering. The Office of National Drug Control estimates that over $150 billion worth of illegal drugs are sold annually in the US. Instead of trying to do something meaningful with their lives, more and more Americans are seeking short term happiness by resorting to drugs. As long as this demand persists, the illicit trade in drugs will continue. Drug addiction is now a major problem all across America. There are over 2 million people in prison in America. Many are imprisoned because they turned to crime to finance the cost of their drug addiction, and others are imprisoned for selling drugs illegally. America now has proportionately three times the prison population of Britain. Black prisoners account for 38% of the prison population, but make up only 13% of the population.

Out of Hand. The opioid epidemic in the United States impacts public health, economic productivity, and community safety nationwide.

Materialism and greed have replaced morality and ethics. Americans are buying guns, overdosing on drugs, getting divorced, and getting into debt as never before. Racism continues to plague the country. Millions of Americans feel that they are not sharing in the wealth of the country. They are angry and full of hate. Anarchy is now common in many of its cities  and the political divide is unbreachable. The radical left has embarked on a socialist ideology that is against everything that made America great. Some American cities have become sanctuary cities for those who entered the country without going through the correct procedures. Some cities have experienced blackouts, followed by looting in certain areas. The looters believe that they are entitled to take whatever they can. They resent all forms of authority. The social cohesion of society is in danger. There is a very thin line between anarchy and law and order. The radical left is demanding the defunding of the police. This is the surest way to promote lawlessness and ensure a breakdown of society.  

In 2025, over $5 billion was spent on hiring lobbyists to influence lawmakers in Washington. The lobbyists promote the interests of the health industry, the oil industry, the military industrial complex, the national rifle association, big business, the farmers or whatever they are paid to promote.  Even if it is against the interests of the American society at large, lobbyists promote whatever they are very well paid to do. Undoubtedly, powerful lobbyists have ensured that the tax system favors the wealthy.

Peddling Power. Stepping up for a day of lobbying at the Capital building, Washington, DC. (Photo: Melanie Stetson Freeman / Staff)

In January 1981, Ronald Reagan was sworn in as the 40th American president. He promised to lower taxes, increase defense spending, and balance the budget. When asked how he was going to do this, he laughed and went to play golf. He lowered taxes and increased defense spending and ten months later, for the first time in American history, the federal deficit exceeded $1 trillion. It had taken nearly 200 years to reach a deficit of this magnitude. Fifty-five years later the federal deficit now stands at a staggering $40 trillion. The last American president to balance the budget was Bill Clinton between 1998 to 2001. Under President Trump, the federal deficit has increased by over $2 trillion in one year. This is unprecedented.  What this means is that on average, the American government is now spending over $151 billion more than the revenue it collects every month. Clearly this is unsustainable.

The US defense budget for 2026 is over $960 billion. Interest on the federal debt is now even greater than the defense budget and will exceed $1 trillion for 2026. The implications are staggering. If we divide the present Federal debt by the population of the country, we get a debt of over $117,000 per person. This is just the federal debt. If we add state debt, mortgage debt, credit card debt, corporate and individual debt, we are looking at a debt of well over $200,000 per person. Clearly Americans are living on borrowed money.   

Compounding the debt problem is the fact that life expectancy has increased.  The result is that social security, Medicaid and government pension funds are all actuarially bankrupt, and will require huge additional funding to sustain them in the future. America is locked into a system of entitlements that are unaffordable and unsustainable. The rising cost of living and especially health insurance costs, are causing even working families to be unable to save enough for retirement. This does not augur well for the future. Clearly Americans are living in debt, and the gap between the rich and the poor is widening at an alarming rate. Corporate and individual greed has become a way of life. Today, the top 1% of the richest people in America own 30% of the nation’s wealth, while the bottom 50% own 2.5% of the nation’s wealth.   

For years, scientists have sounded the alarm about the rise of greenhouse gases and climate change. In the past year, record high temperatures have led to wildfires that have devastated tens of thousands of acres of forests, and caused billions of dollars in damage across the world. In Greenland, the ice is melting, and in Europe, glaciers are shrinking at an alarming rate. The temperature of the oceans is increasing. The American population is less than 4.2% of the world’s population, yet it produces between 11 to 12% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Per capita, Americans are the world’s worst climate offenders. President Trump is in denial that human behavior has contributed to climate change. He has withdrawn America from the Paris Climate Agreement and has promoted policies that adversely affect the environment. Global warming is a global problem that requires a global solution. America needs to be part of the solution to climate change.

Global Warming to Global Warning. Requiring a global solution, the US needs to be part of the solution to climate change.

Unfortunately, there is very little common ground between Republicans and Democrats at the moment. The fact that America needs to raise the federal debt ceiling over and over again, contradicts President Trump’s claim that the American economy is in great shape. The American economy is facing a mountain of entitlements and debt that every serious economist should be warning about. The big question is how much longer will the world continue to place its trust in the value of the dollar?  If this trust falls, investors are unlikely to buy US government bonds. This could lead to a situation in which America defaults on a debt payment. The repercussions of such a move will be catastrophic. The world’s financial system will collapse on a scale that will make the financial crash of 1929 seem like child’s play. There is an old adage that states “when America sneezes the world catches a cold.”

Debt Clock Ticking. A view of a bus shelter at Independence Avenue and 9th St’s SW where an electronic billboard and a poster display the current U.S. National debt per person and as a nation at 40 trillion dollars on August 30, 2026 in Washington, DC. (Photo: Jemal Countess/Getty Images)

America needs to confront the unsustainable debt burden that threatens to devastate the country, and plunge the world into a depression. At a minimum, the American government needs to raise taxes, reduce expenses, and balance the budget. America cannot continue on its present path without bringing upon itself and the world a catastrophic situation. The writing is now on the wall. America needs responsible leadership that will retain the world’s trust in the dollar. One thing that appears inevitable is that “a house divided cannot stand.”  



About the writer:

Accountant Neville Berman had an illustrious sporting career in South Africa, being twice awarded the South African State Presidents Award for Sport and was a three times winner of the South African Maccabi Sportsman of the Year Award.  In 1978 he immigrated to the USA  to coach the United States men’s field hockey team, whereafter, in 1981 he immigrated to Israel where he practiced as an accountant and then for 20 years was the Admin Manager at the American International School in Even Yehuda, Israel.  He is married with two children and one granddaughter.








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).

REMEMBERING RAB

Jewish survivors of the Rab concentration camp form battalion to fight the Nazi German forces occupying Yugoslavia.

By Michel Levine

At the beginning of the WWII, without firing a single shot, the Jewish inmates of a detention camp located in Yugoslavia revolted and took control of the site. They then formed themselves into a battalion and took part in the partisan struggle for the liberation of the country. This curious and probably unique episode deserves to be better known.

In April 1941, the Axis forces seized the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.

In their occupation zone, German troops carried out mass killings and deportations to extermination camps. In the zone controlled by their Bulgarian allies, Jews were handed over to the Germans and likewise sent to Auschwitz. In the Hungarian occupation zone, after the Novi Sad pogrom, which claimed 4,000 victims, the surviving Jews experienced a certain respite until the German occupation of Hungary in the spring of 1944, which in turn led to their deportation to the gas chambers. At the same time, the Germans created in Croatia a puppet state, the Independent State of Croatia (Nezavisna Država Hrvatska, NDH), led by the fascist Ante Pavelić, whose program was expressed in three fundamental points: kill one third of the Serbs living on its territory, expel another third, and assimilate the surviving third. To achieve this, concentration camps were opened in which thousands of Serbians, Jewish, Roma, and Croatian prisoners — opponents of the regime or merely suspects — perished. Its troops, the Ustaše, fought both the Communist partisans and the Serbian royalist Chetniks while carrying out numerous pogroms along the way. It is estimated that between 1941 and 1945, out of a Jewish population of 80,000 persons, more than 67,000 were murdered, one of the highest destruction rates in Europe.

Things unfolded differently in the occupation zones held by the Italian army (Albania, Kosovo, Montenegro, southern Slovenia, and the Dalmatian coast), as well as in the territories directly annexed by Rome (Slovenia and Croatia).

Although living conditions for the populations subjected to this armed occupation were made extremely difficult by hunger and mistreatment, Italian occupation officers, supported in this by senior officials of their foreign ministry, refused to commit the mass crimes carried out by their German, Bulgarian, or Ustaše allies. The Italian army even went so far as to establish “protective camps” for Jews in order to shield them from Nazi fury, at Crikvenica, Kraljevica, Selce, Novi Vinodol, and on the islands of Lopud, Brač, Hvar, and Korčula, among others.

Seen here in July 1942, are prisoners under the control of an Italian official at the Rab concentration camp, one of several Italian concentration camps established during WWII on the Italian-annexed island of Rab.

Thus, in July 1942, 2,500 Jews captured during operations conducted by the Italian army against the Yugoslav partisans were transferred to the island of Rab (Arbe in Italian), located along the Dalmatian coast. There they discovered a vast complex of barracks and tents situated near the village of Kampor. The Arbe civilian internment camp (Campo di concentramento per internati civili di Guerra – Arbe) already held between 10,000 and 15,000 detainees, mainly Slovenes, Croats, and Jews. Although conditions there were dreadful for all inmates, with cold, famine, dysentery, scurvy, beriberi, and scabies rampant in these makeshift lodgings, Jewish prisoners enjoyed certain concessions, such as exemption from forced labor and a certain freedom of movement. A former Slovenian detainee, Anton Vratuša — who after the war would become Yugoslavia’s ambassador to the United Nations — summarized the situation as follows:

“We were all prisoners, but they were protected.”

He added: “We used their help.” What did he mean by this?

Among the Jewish prisoners, there was far from complete trust with respect to the Italian military authorities. Certainly, they had disobeyed orders by shielding them from the Nazis, but this trial of strength could at any moment turn disastrous: several examples were already known of camps where Italian soldiers had been forced by their German allies to hand over their Jewish prisoners.

It therefore became urgent to leave the island as quickly as possible.

A small group among them, including Viktor Hajon, a member of the Yugoslav Communist Party (and a famous polo player before the war), who had just failed in an escape attempt, established contact with a clandestine committee formed before their arrival. This committee included members of the People’s Liberation Movement founded by Josip Broz — soon to become known under his nickname Tito. Its armed branch, the People’s Liberation Army of Yugoslavia (Narodnooslobodilačka vojska, or N.O.V.), fought the occupiers. Unlike General Mihailović’s royalist Chetniks, Tito, a seasoned Communist apparatchik accustomed to clandestine work since 1934, had built a structured, hierarchical army highly suited to guerrilla warfare, whose headquarters constantly moved through the mountains of Bosnia and Montenegro. Its strength also lay in uniting within its ranks, on equal terms, Jews, Muslims, Orthodox Christians, and Roman Catholics, in a country where wars of religion were compounded by ethnic conflicts. At its height, his army numbered 800,000 fighters.

Failing in his attempted escapes, famed Jewish Yugoslav water polo player before WWII, Viktor Hajon made contact outside the camp with the People’s Liberation Movement founded by Tito.

Representatives of the Jewish group proposed supplying intelligence to the clandestine committee, taking advantage of their relative freedom of movement within the camp. Their information concerned guard schedules, contacts with the Italian headquarters on the mainland coast, and so forth. The clandestine committee decided to make use of this cooperation. The ultimate goal was to organize an uprising in the camp, but a serious problem confronted everyone: the lack of weapons. While waiting to acquire some, the two groups organized special courses given by doctors and nurses on emergency medical care for the wounded. These would prove extremely valuable in the events that followed.

History itself would come to the aid of the internees.

On 8 September 1943, news of Italy’s capitulation spread through the camp, giving the signal for action. The prisoners disarmed their guards without encountering any real resistance — it must be said that the guards themselves had only one desire: to return home as quickly as possible. This remains the only example of the liberation of a concentration camp during WWII that caused not a single casualty. But the Italian soldiers, aware that they themselves now risked capture and execution by their former German allies if taken prisoner, often chose instead to join the insurgents.

The Italian flag hangs over the Rab concentration camp on the island of Rab in the Adriatic Sea which was occupied by Italy and is now a part of Croatia. (Public domain via Wikimedia Commons)

Two days later, a large gathering took place in the camp’s “Square of Hunger”, during which the “Rab Partisan Brigade” was created. Numbering around 1,700 future fighters, it was incorporated into the 24th Division of Tito’s People’s Liberation Army of Yugoslavia. For the Jewish internees, integration into this force posed no problem: they knew that within this partisan army — then the strongest and best organized in Europe — a number of leaders were themselves Jewish, such as Moša Pijade. They would therefore be recognized as Jewish fighters “in their own right.”

The Jewish Rab Battalion (also known as the 5th Rab Battalion), formed on the Adriatic island of Rab after the September 1943 armistice with Italy liberated the Rab concentration camp, is seen here marching in September 1943.

The Rab Island Brigade was structured into five battalions. The first four were mainly Slovenian, while the fifth consisted of 250 Jews, generally adolescents, together with a medical unit of around 35 Jewish nurses, some of whom would later be assigned to other battalions. The unit was commanded by David Deča Kabiljo, a reserve officer, assisted by Edvard Ehrlich, the political commissar, who would later be killed in combat.

Yet the joy of liberation was mixed with deep apprehension: German soldiers could land on the island at any moment to retake control. It was necessary to leave as quickly as possible. It was decided to leave behind 204 Jewish detainees who were in too poor a physical condition to be transported. Tragically, they would later be deported to Auschwitz when German troops regained possession of the island.

On 17 September 1943, after a short crossing, the brigade landed at Novi Vinodol, a port on the mainland coast, where it joined the partisans of the People’s Liberation Army. A long march then began northward toward territories controlled by the N.O.V.’s 7th Banija Division. For sixteen days, the fighters advanced through the mountains and dense forests of inland Croatia, passing through areas sometimes held by the Chetniks, with whom relations could be tense. The battalion’s men were then incorporated into the 7th Partisan Division, which had just suffered heavy losses against the Germans. They received accelerated military training and were deployed in the regions of Banija, Kordun, and Lika — three inland Croatian areas that were theaters of particularly intense operations, where the partisans had to fight both Wehrmacht troops and Ustaše forces, who did not hesitate to execute prisoners. More than one hundred members of the Jewish battalion fell in combat between the autumn of 1943 and the end of the war in May 1945.

Ustaše militants pose with victims during the war. The fascist Croatian nationalist group murdered tens of thousands of Serbs, Jews and Roma. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum estimates the Ustaše killed between 77,000 and 99,000 people, including up to 20,000 Jews, at Jasenovac, a death camp the group ran itself. (Courtesy: Memorijalni Muzej Jasenovac)

After peace returned, Tito’s Communist regime, from the moment it seized power, granted a place of honor in its official pantheon to the struggle of the partisans, Jewish and non-Jewish alike. Among the Jewish fighters, seven received the supreme distinction of National Hero — posthumously, with only two exceptions: Moša Pijade and General Voja Todorović, later appointed commander of the state’s land forces. In 1948, the year the State of Israel was created, the Communist authorities officially declared themselves hostile to Zionism, but Tito remained one of the few Eastern Bloc leaders to allow Jews to leave his country freely and emigrate to their new homeland.

Today, a memorial erected on the island of Rab commemorates the Jewish brigade, and each year gatherings known as Beyachad (“together” in Hebrew) bring together its descendants in remembrance. The memorial also serves as a reminder of the existence of the Italian concentration camps, for those inclined to forget. At the Shoah Memorial Museum in Paris, one may admire a striking photograph of the Jewish battalion of Rab Island cheerfully marching toward its future battles.

The battalion’s epic was also celebrated in song. In 1944, a young fighter, Shalom “Shani” Altarac, descended from a family of cantors from Sarajevo, composed in the Croatian forests of Kordun and Banija a Judeo-Spanish parody of the ritual songs of the Haggadah (the liturgical text recounting the liberation of the Jews under Pharaoh), which he called the Partisan Haggadah. The text reinterpreted the Exodus story to match communist ideology, viewing the insurrection of slaves against Pharaoh as a parallel to the proletariat uprising against capitalist and Axis oppressors. It famously begins with the line, “This is the bread of affliction that the Jewish partisans ate in the Croatian forests…”

Rather than being a one-time wartime artifact, Sarajevo’s Jewish community continued to recite this humorous parody at the very end of their community seders for decades after the war.



About the writer:

Michel Levine is a historian of Human Rights and the author of a work dedicated to the major cases of the League of Human Rights (Unclassified Cases. Unpublished Archives of the League of Human Rights, Paris, Fayard, 1973).
Further publications include a historical investigation on the repression of Algerian demonstrations in Paris in October 1961 (The October Ratonnades. A Collective Murder in Paris in 1961, Paris, Ramsay, 1985; reissue Jean- Claude Gawsewitch Publisher, 2001.)







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 – 11 October 2026

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THE ISRAEL BRIEF – 05-07 October 2026
(Click on the blue title)



Lay of the Land’s ‘Photo Pick’ of the Week

ISRAEL MARKS 3 YEARS SINCE OCTOBER 7 ATTACKS

Across the land, Israelis gathered on Wednesday to mourn victims of the deadliest attacks on Jews since the Holocaust

Message in the Sand. A drone view shows an installation depicting bodies, on the third anniversary of the deadly October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack from Gaza, at a beach in Tel Aviv, Israel, October 7, 2026. The text reads:
“The price of failure. 1163 murdered. 251 hostages”. (Photo: Aviv Atlas/via 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)

WORD HAS IT

Orwell at the UN General Assembly (UNGA 81) – Decoding the anti-Israel Diplomatic Bias.
By Yoram Blumstein

Rousing Rhetoric. Orwell recognized how public perception could be manipulated through the deliberate corruption of words, a stratagem perfected by Israel’s enemies. A dissection of the verbal abuse against the Jewish state at the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly, September, 2026.

WORD HAS IT
(Click on the blue title)



(2)

THE ISRAELI POLITICAL STALEMATE

Two alternatives to forming an Israeli government
By Neville Berman

Bowing Out. Come the elections on the 27 October, all the polls indicate that neither of the two leading parties will be able to form a unifying centrist governing coalition, resulting in another predictable stalemate. “For the good of the country,” the divisive needs to depart – Bibi, resign now!

THE ISRAELI POLITICAL STALEMATE
(Click on the blue title)



(3)

SAUDI ARABIA’S SECRET JEWISH MISTRESS

The secret tryst that no one wants to admit is happening.
By Jonathan Feldstein

Twisted Tryst. Unsatiated with its four wives – Pakistan, Türkiye, Egypt and the US – the Saudis run to one
they will not introduce at family gatherings or even publicly acknowledge. Let’s call it what it is –
Saudi Arabia is treating Israel as “a secret mistress.”

SAUDI ARABIA’S SECRET JEWISH MISTRESS
(Click on the blue title)




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

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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 – 05-07 October 2026

05 October 2026 – UK Green Party votes in a motion effectively calling for and end to Israel, more details about intended target of Flight 1073, Israel commemorates Hebrew anniversary of 7/10 and more on The Israel Brief.



06 October 2026 – Fallout from the Green Party motion grows, Israel prepares to mark 7/10 and more on The Israel Brief.



07 October 2026 – Israel marks 3 years since October 7. Personal reflections 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).

WORD HAS IT

Orwell at the UN General Assembly (UNGA 81) – Decoding the anti-Israel Diplomatic Bias.

By Yoram Blumstein

In the aftermath of October 7th, an alarming new reality has gripped global Jewry: a wave of antisemitism and anti-Israel animus. This has been fueled by the overlapping efforts of states, non-state actors, and multilateral organisations (the UN, the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court, and other agencies). The 81st Session of UNGA bore testimony to the lies, manipulation of political language and distortion of truth for pure emotional intimidation, as leader after leader took to the UN rostrum to accuse Israel of “genocide”, “war crimes”, “mass starvation”, and creating conditions resembling a “concentration camp.” George Orwell, one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century, would have characterised the speeches of world leaders or their representatives (especially those of Brazil, Ireland, Spain, Turkey, Iran, Jordan, Qatar, France, Malaysia, the Palestinian Authority,and South Africa) as corrupt language designed to obscure their real intentions using metaphors and imagery about Israel’s purported “genocidal” conduct in Gaza. Orwell’s written masterpieces (like Nineteen Eighty-Four) were prescient. In his 1946 essay, ‘Politics and the English Language’, Orwell aptly stated:
 “Political language…is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.”

War of Words. George Orwell recognized that political power is sustained not just through physical force, but through the deliberate corruption of words, a stratagem in the armory of Israel’s multifarious enemies.

This article applies an Orwellian diagnostic approach to dissect the diplomatic rhetoric which was nonchalantly employed by anti-Israel delegates at UNGA 81, where calumnies about the only Jewish state were employed as political weapons to manipulate public perception, while distorting the facts and the objective reality in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), as well as Gaza. Such mendacities, especially if spewed from the rostrum of the world’s premier international organisation, against the Jewish state carry enormous weight in the court of public opinion and have real-world impact on the Israeli government and Jews.  In using Orwellian tools, this article seeks to decode the speech of the main state sponsor of Hamas/Muslim Brotherhood terrorism and genocidaire-in-chief, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. While other world leaders used similar anti-Israel canards, the singular honour must go to Erdoğan (who stands as one of Israel’s most vocal critics) since his speech was laden with political lies, devoid of legality, and nothing more than pretentious diction.  By deconstructing Erdoğan’s speech as pre-packaged lies, the article will extract specific speech acts used by the Turkish president in his invective against the State of Israel and juxtapose them with real-world facts grounded in legality and empirical observation.

Master of Malevolence.  Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has a long history of severe verbal attacks against Israel, frequently labeling the country a “terrorist state” and comparing its leadership to the Nazi regime. (Photo: Adem ALTAN / AFP via Getty Images)

DECYPHERING TURKEY’S LIES ABOUT ISRAEL

Instead of using the general debate to promote international peace and security initiatives (especially in the Middle East), Erdoğan devoted a large portion of his speech to spreading lies about Israel and promoting a clear domestic and international agenda.  In Orwellian terminology, Erdoğan’s speech was littered with metaphors, imagery, political theatrics, selective moral outrage, and terminology, while obscuring the truth to fill political bandwidth. Yet, the Turkish leader is guilty of the very baseless charges he levels against Israel and thus deflects self-scrutiny.

“Gaza is the most inhuman concentration camp of our time…” and “the world’s largest graveyard for children…”

This was a high-octane and emotionally charged statement by Erdoğan. As such, it was designed for maximum impact. It is palpable that references to “concentration camp” and “graveyard” are insensitive and invoke historical analogies with the Holocaust, when the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (commonly known as the Nazi Party) killed more than six million Jews through gassing, summary execution and starvation. This is historical inversion and an affront to the Jewish people, the remaining Holocaust survivors and their families. Turkey is clearly creating a simplified good-versus-evil dichotomy, while purposefully ignoring geopolitical complexities and concealing Erdoğan’s hideous policies against the Kurds in northern Syria and Iraq.

How would Orwell relate to the above? Erdoğan is known for his double standards. He portrays himself as the leader of the Muslim world. Yet, he has:

– committed genocide against the Kurds in northern Syria and Iraq, as he will not countenance the creation of a Kurdish corridor or crescent (straddling northern Syria, Turkey, northern Iraq, and western Iran)

– armed and sponsored the former leader of the now-disbanded terrorist outfit Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and now president of Syria, Ahmed Hussein al-Sharaa (formerly known by his nom de guerre, Abu Mohammad al-Julani), as a proxy against the Syrian Kurds

– supports Islamist movements in Libya and Sudan, and

– hosts Hamas leaders.

Hence, Erdoğan lacks the moral authority to lecture Israel on morality, and he should be treated as a diabolical, homicidal creature. The Turkish president’s specific utterance was not based on facts, but on weaponising language for political gain. The truth speaks for itself. Gaza is not a “concentration camp” or “graveyard” for children. It is an active combat zone; Hamas terrorists are doing the fighting, and Israel has taken extraordinary steps to minimise civilian casualties. In fact, the Israeli Defense Forces’ (IDF) Coordinator for the Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) has assisted Israeli, regional and international aid agencies with the erection of temporary tents. At the same time, what government, bent on confining people to a “concentration camp”, would coordinate with international agencies to launch a polio vaccination campaign, if the intention is to kill them? By using and inverting the Holocaust analogy of “concentration camps”, Israel did not put policies and resources in place to confine Gazans to a specific location to eventually kill Palestinians. Conversely, this is exactly what Adolf Hitler and his henchmen did against Jews in major concentration camps in Germany, Poland, Austria, France, Estonia, Latvia, and the Czech Republic. They intended to exterminate all Jews as part of Hitler’s “Final Solution”, which was carried out by Adolf Eichmann, Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich.  It is inaccurate to portray Israel as having created a “graveyard for children”, as the IDF has taken reasonable measures, in line with international humanitarian law, to protect children in Gaza. The faux sultan, Erdoğan, willfully neglected to inform the General Assembly that Hamas used hospitals, schools and public facilities in Gaza as shields and weapons storage facilities in its terrorist campaign against the IDF and Gazans. Tragically, children died in the war, yet Turkey, which, along with Qatar, has enabled Hamas to build its own open-air prison, from which it launched its murderous campaign against Jews and Israelis on October 7th. Erdogan also omitted the fact that COGAT continues to coordinate with Israeli humanitarian agencies to distribute vital baby formula to Gazans, as Hamas has intercepted aid supplies. The double standard is clear: There is no condemnation that Hamas started the war against Israel and should bear responsibility for all fatalities in Gaza. Israel was under attack and responded in self-defense. Check your facts, Erdoğan!  

“Insatiable genocidal mindset…” and “state terrorism”

Erdoğan’s arsenal of egregious statements against Israel includes references to the Israeli government as inherently “genocidal” and engaging in “state terrorism.” He further asserted that:

 “There is no war in Gaza; there are no two sides. This is an invasion, a massacre, a genocide, a policy of mass destruction.”

Israel never committed genocide and only acted in self-defense. The IDF launched “Operation Swords of Iron” to rescue the hostages and target those responsible for the October 7th massacre. This was a legitimate response, in line with the law of armed conflict. Regrettably, Erdoğan seems to be inspired by South Africa’s genocide case against Israel. The threshold to prove genocide is exceedingly high, as it is often referred to as the “crime of crimes.” The 1948 Genocide Convention defines genocide as “the specific intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a protected national, ethnic, racial, or religious group as such.” The accuser or the plaintiff must prove specific intent (dolus specialis) and the mental element (mens rea). Therefore, it is not enough to demonstrate massive civilian casualties, widespread destruction, or severe human suffering. In fact, Hamas is responsible for the implosion of Gaza, as it launched an unjustified attack on Israel. Erdoğan and his ally, the avaricious African National Congress (ANC), rely excessively on individual statements by a few senior Israeli politicians to prove “genocidal intent.” Israel’s legal team cogently argued that individual Israeli politicians’ statements were taken out of context and expressed in anger at the surprise October 7th attacks (the deadliest in Israel’s history since the Holocaust). The ICJ requires proof that political statements translated into official government policy that directed IDF commanders and soldiers to carry out “genocidal actions” in Gaza. This is a no-brainer since Israel did not display intent to kill and displace Palestinians. It is a figment of Erdoğan and South Africa’s imagination. The IDF’s actions were aimed at targeting Hamas’ terrorist infrastructure and leadership, and it put measures in place to ensure the safety of civilians in Gaza.  

In Orwellian terms, Erdoğan has failed to separate rhetoric from facts. As a matter of fact, Erdoğan should be hauled before the ICC and ICJ for war crimes and genocide committed against the Kurds, as his campaign was intentional and specific. He unleashed the full might of the Turkish army, intelligence and its proxies in northern Syria and Iraq to exterminate the Kurds, who rightfully deserve a state of their own. The Turkish government does not distinguish between Kurdish fighters (who have been instrumental in the defeat of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria – ISIS) and civilians. Additionally, Erdoğan has exported his brand of Islamist fundamentalism to radical Islamists in Libya, Sudan and part of the Horn of Africa with political and material support, which continues to undermine regional stability and the peacemaking efforts of the African Union, Gulf countries and the international community.

BUILDING A RESILIENT, OFFENSIVE AND DEFENSIVE ECOSYSTEM IN DEFENSE OF ISRAEL

As lies and propaganda against Israel and the Jewish people will continue unabated, it is important to reclaim the narrative battlespace. By its own admission, the Israeli government has done a terrible job in promoting Israel’s international image since October 7th. In his address to UNGA 81, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu correctly pointed out that Israel is fighting a battle on the eighth front: the battle for the truth.  Erdoğan and those of his ilk are the chief purveyors of false claims of genocide. The Turkish leader’s anti-Israel missive is nothing more than bullshit. In an entertaining little book, ‘On Bullshit’ (2005), Harry G. Frankfurt remarked that, “A person who undertakes bullshit his way through has much more freedom. His focus is panoramic rather than particular. He does not limit himself to inserting a certain falsehood at a specific point, and thus he is not constrained by the truths surrounding that point or intersecting it. He is prepared, so far as required, to fake the context as well.”

Rousing Rhetoric. Erdoğan speaks of the “ murderous ideology called Zionism” and said that “the genocide network has turned Gaza into the world’s largest cemetery for children.”

As Israel is central to Jewish identity, it behoves Jews to act as citizen-diplomats for the State of Israel and disabuse the liars of maligning the only Jewish state. The South African Jewish community, although Lilliputian in size (52 300, according to a recent study by the Kaplan Center for Jewish Studies at the University of Cape Town) compared to other diaspora communities, is the most Zionist in orientation, as evidenced by the indefatigable spirit of the leadership and volunteers of the South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD) and Zionist Federation (SAZF), which continue to engage with the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) and the South African Presidency whenever unwarranted policies and statements are made against Israel. This is active citizen diplomacy, as South African Jews accept constructive criticism of Israel, but not when it pivots towards antisemitism, extremism and lies. The South African Jewish community, of which I am a proud member, has built an effective ecosystem in defense of Israel. Other diaspora communities should take a page from the South African Jewish community’s commendable pro-Israel efforts.



About the writer:

Editor’s Note: Yoram Blumstein is a nom de plume the author uses to protect their identity because of previous security threats.





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