Where is the global outrage at new UN finding of Hamas’ obstruction of humanitarian aid?
By Kenneth Moeng Kgwadi
There has been near-total silence from many of Israel’s critics following the recent United Nations (UN) finding that Hamas obstructed the delivery of much-needed humanitarian aid to civilians in Gaza. Hamas had long portrayed the humanitarian crisis as solely the result of others denying Gazans access to necessities such as food, medicine, water, clothing, and other essential supplies. However, the UN’s finding indicates that Hamas itself also played a role in preventing civilians from accessing this aid.
Trucks and the Truth. While for much of the war in Gaza, Israel has repeatedly accused Hamas of stealing humanitarian aid, intimidating aid workers and exploiting relief operations for its own benefit (seen above), the UN has finaly now issued a statement condemning what it describes as armed personnel affiliated with Gaza’s de facto authorities for interfering with humanitarian operations, entering aid distribution sites, assaulting aid workers and disrupting the delivery of humanitarian assistance.
Such actions serve Hamas’ political objectives by reinforcing its narrative of victimhood on the global stage. By obstructing humanitarian assistance while simultaneously presenting itself as the defender of Gaza’s population, Hamas has contributed to shaping international perceptions of the conflict in ways that advance its own strategic interests.
This is the same group of people who refused to allow people to leave endangered locations for the humanitarian zones after the Israel Defense Force (IDF) issued warnings of impending strikes. In their minds, they were being strategic in order for Israel to kill civilians and have blood on its hands, so that the world would believe that the IDF is the monster and isolate Israel in order to achieve their political and religious ends. It has previously been stated that Hamas is using innocent civilians as human shields, but to date the UN has neither seen, investigated, nor acknowledged some of these indictments.
In a strongly worded statement dated 12 July 2026, the UN Deputy Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process and Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Dr. Ramiz Alakbarov, said:
“I strongly condemn the recent obstruction of humanitarian operations in Gaza by the de facto authorities, which endangered humanitarian personnel, intimidated workers delivering lifesaving food assistance and disrupted lifesaving humanitarian assistance.”
What happened on Saturday, when armed Hamas men ambushed two truck drivers at a World Food Program warehouse, was not the first time they had stolen, hijacked, or intimidated humanitarian personnel. At the height of the war between Israel and Hamas, they stole food aid in order to feed their insurgents in the tunnels, while the remaining food aid was sold at exorbitant prices to the poor people of Gaza. Since its formation in 1987, Hamas has become accustomed to not taking any form of accountability for its actions. They always falsely blame Israel as a political strategy and people who accept this false narrative are complacent in the destitution that the people of Gaza are confronting.
Truth be Told. Following the IDF saying months ago that Hamas was hijacking aid trucks and stealing aid and were denounced as liars, the UN’s Deputy Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, and Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, admits that Hamas stole aid and disrupted distribution.
Hamas won political power in 2006 but has held elections in 20 years. It recently announced the dissolution of its governing “Emergency Committee” stepping aside to transfer administrative authority to the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG) as part of the U.S.-brokered peace and ceasefire plan.
As a government ruling more than two million people, they have only brought terror to the lives of those people by inviting unnecessary wars, while they could have created a conducive environment for their people to thrive. It is highly unlikely that Hamas would be attacked by Israel without any provocation because Israel has invested its time and resources in establishing ties with its neighbours. In all the wars that have taken place between Israel and Hamas, it has always been Hamas that started the war, with Israel counter-attacking as a form of defense of its territory.
Since 2006, Hamas has been majorly responsible for the poor material conditions of the people of Gaza through its political divisions, incompetence, corruption, and war-mongering policies. Throughout the past 20 years, they have never gone to elections to allow the citizens to vote for their preferred government and use elections as an accountability mechanism, which means they have continuously imposed themselves on the people of Gaza to their detriment.
Hamas Takeover. Seen here in 2007, Hamas security force officers attack a Fatah supporter as he lays on the ground in Gaza City, following Hamas’ violent takeover of the Strip in June. (Photo: Adel Hana / AP)
About the writer:
Kenneth MoengKgwadiis a political scientist, journalist, and research fellow at the Middle East Africa Research Institute (MEARI).
*Feature picture:Hamas Hijack. A Hamas coordinated intercepting food aid from trucks.
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).
Failures leading to October 7 followed by poor policies since, necessitate a switch in direction and a ditch of leadership.
By David E. Kaplan
Addressing the 2026 Herzliya Conferenceat Reichman University, an exuberant and entertaining US Ambassador, Mike Huckabee said that when President Trump
“….. was looking who to appoint as the new ambassador for Israel, he said “Find me a ‘Maccabee”. Maybe, his folks didn’t hear him right so here I am instead – a Huckabee.”
All familiar with the biblical history, everyone laughed; it was witty but it was the proverbial ‘last laugh’ of the two-day intense conference such are the distressing existential issues confronting Israel today.
Two-Way Street. Following US VP JD Vance saying much of Israel’s defense was American-made and taxpayer-funded, US Ambassador Mike Huckabee says Israel provides technology, agriculture and intelligence that ‘saves, protects and takes care of Americans all over the world’.
PRESERVING DEMOCRACY
The tone of the Conference was set in a riveting interview of retired Supreme Court President Aharon Barak by Maj. Gen. (Res.) Prof. Amos Gilead. The warm applause that greeted this retired jurist and judge was telling of a man who survived the Kovno Ghetto by being smuggled out in a sack before his family immigrated to Mandatory Palestine and who would serve as President of the Supreme Court of Israel from 1995 to 2006.
Saving the State. Maj. Gen. (Res.) Prof. Amos Gilead (right) interviews retired Supreme Court President Aharon Barak at the 22nd Herzliya Conference, who delivers a stark warning about the state of Israeli democracy, cautioning that the country lacks critical checks and balances and is “moving away from being democratic.” The Hon. Prof. Aharon Barak | Herzliya Conference 2026
Known for his monumental impact on Israeli law, he warned Israeli democracy was unraveling. Undoing much of the safeguards he had contributed in securing, Barak warned that Israel was losing – under the current government – the necessary checks and balances, “placing the ultimate responsibility to protect the country’s democracy on the public.”
And why was he then still optimistic, Barak answered:
“There is an upcoming election; the people can change direction.”
The esteemed former Supreme Court justice was saying Israel’s salvation lay not with those today in office but with those tomorrow who will vote!
That “tomorrow” is October 27, 2026.
A DEFINING DIFFERENCE
There was something very different about 2026’s Herzliya Conference. Firstly, it was scheduled for weeks earlier but because there was the fear that the war with Iran would again flare up – which it now has – it was postponed, finally settling June 30 to July 1. Such uncertainty is the norm these days in Israel. As I write, the Maccabi Games or “Jewish Olympics” is being held, having being postponed from the previous year for the same reason – fear of war!
In these turbulent times, missiles raining down on Israel’s civilian population is less a surprise and more a question of:
“Are they from Iran, Hezbollah or the Houthis?” That covers north, east and south, and would also be from the west if Gaza had not been considerably neutralized.
One of the first questions the residents in my apartment complex collectively ask whenever we hurriedly assemble in the bomb shelter following a siren:
“Who is firing at us? Is the missile coming from Iran, Lebanon or Yemen?”
This bizarre scenario is a metaphor for life today in Israel. Our attackers could be coming at us from multiple directions and it could be separate or in concert. How frequently in our bomb shelter I would be on WhatsApp with my brother living in the north of Israel who was under attack from Hezbollah while we, in the center of the country, were under ballistic missile attack from Iran. Israel is surrounded by enemies who actively campaign for its demise hence the theme of this year’s Herzliya Conference was:
“Between National Security and National Resilience”.
A high-level strategic forum for evaluating Israel’s geopolitical standing and domestic resilience, the Herzliya Conference brings informed individuals from the Israel’s political, military, security, intelligence, academic and business communities together to exchange ideas, share knowledge, and build professional relationships.
All this in defense of Israel, but this conference in 2026 there was a difference because speaker after speaker conveyed the fear – Where lies the danger, in Tehran or Jerusalem? Between the crazy Ayatollahs and Bibi’s cobbled – and no less crazy – coalition, one had to try make sense of it all and plot a viable path forward.
As many of the speakers expressed that while Israel relies on “military power”, “economic stability” and “technical innovation”, it relies as much on “social cohesion” and “public trust”, both of which are currently being eroded. The lack of public trust in Netanyahu’s government was expressed in full throttle at the panel discussion surrounding Israel’s avoidance of a State Commission of Inquiry into the October 7 disaster.
Participating in the panel were two fathers who had lost children in the present war. One was Eyal Eshel, father of Roni Eshel, an IDF observation soldier, murdered at the Nahal Oz base on October 7, 2023. Eyal has become a vocal advocate for accountability, demanding a state commission of inquiry and frequently challenging government officials over the security failures that led to the tragedy. What most exposed the Prime Ministers “disconnect” was when Yoram Yehudai, the father of Ron Yehudai, who was murdered at the Nova music festival related his revulsion to the Channel 14 interview when Netanyahu was asked how he had personally changed since October 7 and jokingly replied that he had “lost a little weight“.”
Really?
“I lost a son and he jokes that he lost weight,” and added “I haven’t laughed at jokes in a thousand days.”
Discussions surrounding Israel’s avoidance of a State Commission of Inquiry into the October 7 disaster were a focal point at the 2026 Herzliya Conference with experts, including military and legal analysts, weighing in on the implications of sidestepping this statutory investigative mechanism.
Avoiding a formal State Commission of Inquiry – which is the most authoritative, independent investigative body under Israeli law, possessing the power to subpoena witnesses and issue binding, personal recommendations – shifts the inquiry to internal government reviews or politically appointed committees.
Panelists at the Conference argued that bypassing this independent probe, threatens long-term military accountability and public trust exposing the prime minister and his governing coalition to the not unfair accusation “as being more concerned over political survival” and “preserving wartime coalition stability,” rather than the national interest.
WEIGHTY ISSUES
Also not sharing Netanyahu’s joke about having “lost weight” since October 7, was the former Chief of Staff and an aspiring future prime minister.
Interviewed at the Herzliya Conference by Channel 2’s prime time anchor, Dana Weiss, Gadi Eisenkot – now Leader of the Yashar Party – brought credibility to his criticism of the prime minister, having lost not “weight” but a son and two nephews in the current war. He stated that his primary goal is to defeat Netanyahu’s coalition, asserting that leaders in command on October 7 “are unfit for the future.” He makes the case that “Twice, there was a sovereign Jewish kingdom here in the land of Israel,” referring to the Hasmonean Kingdom and the House of David, and “twice, it collapsed and fell apart in the eighth decade of its existence. Once again, we stand at a fateful point.”
To avoid a repeat dissolution, Eisenkot argued for Israelis to unify and come election, to remove the prime minister who he asserts “is out of touch,” and “unfit” to remain in office.
Eisenkot characterizes the cabinet as lacking independent thought, stating, “We have a weak Cabinet of submissive people,” allowing Netanyahu to lead the country in the wrong direction without challenge.
UNFIT FOR OFFICE
Being “out of touch” and “unfit” was the shared view of many of the speakers of a government that was undermining (during a war) the unity, solidarity and sustainability of Israeli society by its support of the Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) exemption from military and civil service. Conference participants could have opened the front pages of any of the daily papers and seen Haredi protests across the country, blocking traffic in support of their community’s “draft doggers.” This was no ‘Ivory Tower’ academic conference – the issues discussed were playing out on Israeli streets and Israel’s borders.
Experts warned that “demographic shifts and draft exemptions are fracturing national resilience and placing an unsustainable burden on the shrinking portion of the public that serves in the military and productive economy.”
The main concerns expressed regarding the Haredi threat was what was called the collapse of the “People’s Army” – so foundational and fundamental to Israel’s DNA. Experts highlighted that only about a third (35%) of each Israeli cohort completes significant military service. They warned that it is mathematically unsustainable for this minority to bear the security burden for the remaining 65% of the population indefinitely.
Reinforcing this concern, President Isaac Herzog used his address to warn of the “danger of social disintegration.” He stressed “the urgent need to renew the shared civic contract,” pointing to “the growing alienation between draft-exempt sectors and the broader Israeli public” that is actively bearing the costs of ongoing conflicts.
Despite the government pushing support for Hareidi draft dodgers, there is no dodging reality. Surveys presented at the Conference showed that a vast majority of the Israeli public demands equal burden-sharing, with 72% supporting the conscription of the ultra-Orthodox. The failure to integrate the Haredim into national and security service was cited as a “primary driver” of the extremely “low levels of social cohesion and trust in the government.”
President’s Warning. “Instead of being a diverse and thriving society of brothers and sisters, who quarrel and yet reconcile, we risk becoming a landmass that has broken apart into a handful of islands. Islands of exhausted, worn-out people…armed with a sense of absolute righteousness,” warned President Herzog addressing the 2026 Herzliya Conference. (Photo: GPO/Ma’ayan Toaf)
ECONOMIC STRAIN
Also flagged as existential long-term concerns were the failure of the Haredi educational system to incorporate core secular subjects (like math and science) and the community’s general lack of economic productivity.
Economists at the conference warned that as the productive tax base shrinks relative to the rapidly growing Haredi population, the burden on the working sector risks pushing skilled professionals out of the country.
All these discussions occurred against a backdrop of intense societal division, with the Haredi leadership threatening to dissolve the ruling coalition if the government did not advance laws that would permanently freeze draft enforcement and elevate Torah study to a foundational constitutional value.
EPILOGUE
Now post the conference, if ever there is an example why this government has failed to learn its lesson since October 7 and why is needs to be replaced is in the unfolding drama following Israel’s Chief of Staff, Lt.-Gen. Eyal Zamir’s recent letter to PM Netanyahu and others warning against legislation that would freeze arrests of Haredi draft dodgers.
Following months of warning that the IDC is facing a critical manpower shortage and needs an influx of 12,000 soldiers, he wrote that such legislation would create “a disincentive to report for miliary service” since it grants immunity from prosecution and would thus “rather than encourage enlistment” – which is desperately needed – it would do the opposite.
“Such a move would, “ wrote Zamir, “cause a rapture with those who have borne the burden of fighting for the past two and a half years, and would increase the sense of inequality.”
How can one argue against this logic.
Nevertheless, this is precisely what this government is doing by attacking the country’s top military officer accusing him of indulging in politics instead of focusing on “winning the war,” as expressed by Likud backbencher, Amit Levy in an Army Radio interview.
As all at the Conference were reminded, was it not Netanyahu who had deflected any criticism for October 7 arguing that the IDF and intelligence services failed to warm him of Hamas’ planned invasion.
“I was not warned” has been his defense since October 8……
However, we now know this was NOT true. The head of Israeli military intelligence’s Research Division at the time had sent the prime minister a number of letters warning exactly this and the then-IDF Chief of Staff, Herzi Halevi, repeatedly sought to meet with him in the days leading up to October 7 to warn him about the severe security risks posed by Israel’s internal divisions, but was frequently rebuffed. So too then Shin Bet chief, Ronen Bar, who too gave multiple warnings to Netanyahu about Hamas and the rising risk of war in the months and days leading up to October 7.
Now we can understand how Netanyahu and those around him ignored the warnings because they are doing it again – in the open – by publicly ignoring the warning of the head of the IDF that the “military lacks sufficient manpower” thus impairing its ability to fight. Not only are they ignoring the message but are attacking the messenger. They are doing so to preserve power at the expense of the people.
Is there any doubt that under a Netanyahu government the people of Israel are facing a ‘Clear and present danger’.
This was reinforced by Likud stalwart and former Speaker of the Knesset, Yuli Edelstein who gave a sharp address at the Conference titled “A Half-People’s Army” where he criticized the unequal burden of military service. He advocated for “equality in service,” demanding that all Israeli citizens be subject to the same security service laws at age 18, and warned that the current system places an unsustainable burden on the nation’s reservists. As possibly a sign of a changing political landscape, Edelstein announced last month that he was leaving the party and would not run in the upcoming Likud primary.
All must Serve. Speaker of the Knesset, MK Yuli Edelstein stated that Israel’s current conscription model is unsustainable arguing that civic duty and security service must be mandatory for all citizens. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXcy3tVPmsY&t=6s)
The message of the conference:
There is an election coming up or as Gadi Eisencott expressed it in historical terms that we again “stand at a fateful point” and: “We are warned!”
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 power of money to influence, corrupt and ultimately erode the liberal western way of life.
By Neville Berman
(Warning from the writer: There may be incidents referred to below that you may find disturbing)
This article is not about nuclear war, global warming or a strain of some unknown virus that could result in the destruction of mankind. Instead, it is aimed at highlighting the actual greatest current threat facing the liberal Western way of life. Forget about Russia, China or communism as the major threats facing the West. The cold war is over. Russia is clearly no longer the power that Vladimir Putin thought it was when he ordered the Russian army to invade Ukraine. China might be an economic competitor to American financial dominance, but China relies on the markets in the West to ensure that its export-based economy can bring prosperity to China. It would be a strategic mistake for China to believe that its exports will not suffer if it wages war against the West.
The First World War was billed as “the war to end all wars”. It ended with a German surrender, and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire that had ruled large parts of the Middle East for nearly 400 years. The terms of the surrender agreement did not bring peace to Europe, and the Muslim community in the Middle East was plunged into turmoil.
In 1928, Hassan al-Banna started a Sunni Muslim organization in Egypt called the Muslim Brotherhood. He stated the following:
“The nature of Islam is to dominate and not to be dominated, to impose its law on all nations and to extend its power to the entire planet.”
The Enforcer. Founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, one of the largest and most influential global Islamist movements, Hassan al-Banna encouraged Egyptians to abandon Western customs and argued that the state should enforce Islamic public morality.
He rejected nationalism, and regarded all Muslims as members of a single Islamic movement that needed to establish Islamic rule across the world. Its core message was to subjugate the world to Sharia law by means of Jihad. He maintained that Jihad is an obligation from Allah on every Muslim, and that a guaranteed way to heaven was to die fighting for the cause of Islam. Partly due to the social activities in helping the poor, and partly due to the support from the Imams in the Mosques, membership in the Brotherhood grew rapidly across the Arab world. The Egyptian government recognized the threat that the Brotherhood posed to its rule, and in 1949, Hassan al-Banna was assassinated by agents of the Egyptian secret police. Despite his death, the message of the Muslim Brotherhood still resonates with millions of Muslims.
There are two significant changes that have now elevated the threat posed by the Muslim Brotherhood. The first involves the change in the financial position of the major oil and gas exporting countries in the Middle East, and the second involves the huge increase of the number of Muslims now living in the West.
The world runs on oil and gas and Saudi Arabia is the world’s number 1 exporter of oil, and Qatar is the second largest exporter of Liquefied Natural Gas. (LNG) The profits from the sale of these commodities have transformed these previously poverty-stricken countries into modern financial powerhouses. They are now using their financial power to undermine the West, and promote the growth of Islam across the world.
The second important factor is that the liberal West decided to promote a policy of human rights for mankind. The idea of prosperity through diversity, multiculturalism, and equal opportunity, led to the West opening its borders to immigration. Millions of immigrants from poor countries with little or no prospects, moved to the liberal Western world in the hope of finding a better life for themselves and their families. The vast majority of them lack marketable skills, and are impecunious. They do not share the same culture, religion, language or values of the countries that they have immigrated to. The result is that Europe and America now have sizable immigrant and Muslim populations. Saudi Arabia and Qatar have financed Mosques and Islamic cultural centers all across the world to serve the Muslim immigrant communities. The Imams in these institutions have radicalized tens of thousands of their followers to oppose the values of the West, and to see themselves as part of the army of Islam that aims to control the world.
The greatest threat facing the Western world at present is militant Islam coupled with the support that it is receiving from Qatar and other Middle Eastern countries. (The role of Iran and Saudi Arabia as a threat to the West will be presented in a follow up article.)
Qatar is a sovereign country surrounded by the Persian Gulf. It has a small land border that can be used to cross into Saudi Arabia. It has been ruled by the Al Thani family since the mid-19th century. There are approximately 3 million people living in Qatar, of which about 320,000 are Qatari citizens. All the rest are expatriates and guest workers with almost no rights in the country. Qatar has donated billions of dollars to Hamas, which is an affiliate of the Muslim Brotherhood.
All in the Family. Qatar, a small Gulf country with enormous global influence, has been ruled by the Al Thani family since the mid-19th century.
Qatar has the same aims as Al-Qaeda, but is much smarter in its strategy. Instead of blowing up buildings in the West and causing a military retaliation, Qatar is buying the buildings and using its financial resources to gain influence. The Al-Jazeera TV channel is financed by the rulers of Qatar. It broadcasts 24/7 in Arabic and English to 430 million households worldwide. It has radicalized millions of its viewers to hate and despise the West and is laying the seeds of an Islamic takeover of the West.
Qatar has spent billions on financing the building of Middle Eastern departments on all the major American university campuses. Only professors with a track record of being anti-Israel are hired. Their aim is to train the future leaders of America to oppose the values and foundational pillars of Western civilization, and especially to oppose Israel. The end result can be seen in well financed and organized protests against Israel on American campuses and across the Western world.
Gift or Graft? Seeming oblivious to the image of Qatar buying influence at the highest level of the US administration, President Donald Trump celebrates the new Qatari-gifted ‘Air Force One’ before its initial voyage to North Dakota, saying the U.S. “should be very proud” of the new luxury jet.(AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
Qatar has used its enormous wealth to corrupt the world. They bought the right to host the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar. They are also buying influence within the American administration. Steve Witcoff owned a hotel in New York that was sold to Qatar for $400 million. He claims it was at fair market value. According to a Netflix program called Dirty Money, Jared Kushner was bailed out of insolvency by a $400 million loan from Qatar. Witkoff and Kushner are presently the negotiators representing America in negotiating a deal with Iran. Qatar has just presented Trump with the world’s most luxurious Boeing 747 aircraft costing over $400 million. The Attorney General has determined that the gift is legally permissible, as it is gifted to the US government and not to Trump personally. Trump is now using the plane. Whichever way you look at it, there is no doubt that Qatar has bought influence within the highest levels of the US administration. President Trump sees Qatar as a friend and ally of America. Qatar is playing a double game of pretending to be a friend of America, while actively promoting the aims of the Muslim Brotherhood and the downfall of the West.
More than a decade ago, Dutch politician Gert Wilders produced a short movie of the growth of Islam in Holland. The final scene was filmed inside a mosque of an Imam waving a sword during a sermon, declaring, “Come and cut off his head! By Allah, we shall cut it off!”
To Crown it All. This Bel Air home in LA, listed on the market as the US’s most expensive residential property is owned by a Qatari billionaire and former prime minister. Qatar’s ruling Al Thani family and state funds have amassed massive real estate portfolios across Western capitals with their holdings often exceeding those of local monarchs. (Photo: Simon Berlyn/The Beverly Hills Estates)
Gert Wilders was charged with inciting hatred for making and showing the movie. No charges were ever laid against the Imam. There is no doubt that the message of that particular Imam is part of Islam.
In the early hours of October 7, 2023, Hamas invaded Israel. They rejoiced at filming themselves committing the most violent crimes of murder, rape, beheading, and hostage taking. Many people in the West believe that the Muslim concept of Jihad applies only to Jews. They are mistaken. Jihad is aimed at every single person who does not believe in Islam. This is a wakeup call to all those Westerners who are totally ignorant of what Islam and Jihad are all about. One day, when the Islamists decide that it is time to overthrow the West, tens of thousands of militant Islamists that are your fellow citizens, and could be living next door to you, will act in the same way that Hamas acted against Israel. They will take out their guns and invade your residences. They will shoot your dogs, murder your babies and children in front of you. They will gang rape the female members of your family, and then mutilate and decapitate you and your parents. Some of you will have metal rods shoved into your vaginas and others will have your breasts cut off. All of this will be filmed by the people rejoicing at what they have done. Some of you will be kidnaped and kept in cellars. You will either be killed, used as sex slaves, and finally used as bargaining chips to secure the release of other Jihadists that have been incarcerated. If you find the above shocking, then it is time to wake up to the reality of what Hamas actually planned and carried out in Israel. This is what Jihad is all about. As they say in Hollywood, Coming shortly to your neighborhood. Groups such as “Gays for Gaza” are the epitome of the ignorance that exists about the dangers of militant Islam.
Tuitions of Terror. The preferred host of Hamas terrorist leaders, Qatar is the largest foreign donor to American higher education, funneling billions of dollars into U.S. and Western universities. Seen here is Cornell University that received over $2.3 billion. (Credit: Cornell University stock photo)
I will end with what must be the strangest case of genocide ever recorded. Thousands of Palestinians living in the West Bank are finding illegal ways to cross into Israel to find employment. Tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza would gladly come to work in Israel, if Israel would allow them to do so. It defies all logic that all these Palestinians would be trying desperately to come to Israel, if Israel was committing genocide against them. It is time for all those gullible Westerners who are protesting that Israel is committing genocide to understand that you are supporting a blood libel and false narrative. It is time to reflect on your support for those that aim to kill you. It is time to understand the disproportionate role that tiny Israel is playing in preventing militant Islam from taking over the western world.
It is time to say “Thank you Israel.”
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).
For the first time in 44 years, Israel and Lebanon have put their names to a framework agreement. Rubio is presenting it as a first step toward ending the conflict, restoring Lebanese sovereignty, dismantling Hezbollah’s military infrastructure, and creating a verifiable path toward security on Israel’s northern border. The deal reportedly begins with two pilot zones, into which the Lebanese Armed Forces will enter as Israel redeploys. At the same time, the IDF remains in Lebanese territory for as long as Hezbollah continues to pose a threat.
Brave New World. Meeting with CENTCOM Commander Admiral Brad Cooper in Beirut on June 29, Lebanese president Joseph Aoun (centre) is bravely navigating a high-stakes strategy by chartering a historic and unprecedented path directly confronting the Iranian-backed Hezbollah.
This agreement is a meaningful development. It is also where the hard part begins. The agreement creates a process, not an outcome, and the central question is whether anyone can impose that process and outcome on Hezbollah. According to the framework text, Israeli withdrawal is tied to the verified disarmament of non-state armed groups and the dismantling of their infrastructure. That sounds straightforward in Washington. In Lebanon, it runs straight into the political and coercive reality of Hezbollah.
Iran will not let Hezbollah go quietly into that good night. For decades, Hezbollah has been an integral part of Tehran’s regional architecture: a military asset in the plan to destroy Israel, a deterrent, and a lever in wider negotiations. It has proven its utility both by striking inside Israel’s borders and by keeping Lebanon diplomatically tied to Iran’s confrontation with Israel. From Tehran’s perspective, the disarmament of Hezbollah would be a catastrophic strategic loss.
That said, Hezbollah is far more than a line item in an Iranian budget. It has its own funding streams, including smuggling, illicit trade, and international criminal networks. Pressure on Tehran alone will not collapse Hezbollah’s operating capacity. The group has spent years building redundancy into its financing, logistics, and social control.
The pilot-zone mechanism is therefore the key test. The Lebanese army’s entry into the first two areas could be a useful beginning, especially if it establishes a precedent for state authority in places where Hezbollah has long treated Beirut’s sovereignty as an irrelevance. The problem is that Hezbollah overmatches the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) in most important respects: firepower, salaries, coercive capacity, embedded networks, and willingness to intimidate local opponents.
Mapping Path to Peace. This is the map of the “buffer zone” stipulated in the historic agreement signed between the Lebanese and Israeli governments, which will allow Israel to maintain its troops on Lebanese soil commensurate with Hezbollah disarmament.
The success or failure of the deal hinges on operational freedom. If Israel hands areas to the LAF and the LAF cannot prevent Hezbollah retrenchment, can Israel still act? Israeli officials are already saying the IDF will retain freedom of action in the security zone and remain until Hezbollah and other armed groups no longer pose a threat. That answers part of the Israeli security concern, but “pose a threat” is a loose definition and “no longer” may be doing some heavy lifting. Still, it also creates an obvious point of Lebanese and Hezbollah resistance: an agreement framed as restoring sovereignty may be attacked domestically as legitimising an open-ended Israeli presence.
The risk of Lebanese civil war is already more than a theoretical problem. Hezbollah has already rejected the deal, with Naim Qassem describing it as a surrender and saying the group will continue armed resistance. We have seen reports today of an Israeli drone strike in southern Lebanon, in an area outside the newly defined Israeli-held zone. In other words, the announcement has not suspended the underlying dynamics of the conflict.
Set for Showdown. Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem has formally rejected the US-brokered framework agreement signed between Beirut and Jerusalem, characterizing it as a surrender of Lebanese sovereignty stating that the group will not relinquish its arms and is prepared to continue armed resistance.
The same question applies beyond the south. What happens in Hezbollah’s depth areas, including the Bekaa Valley and the logistical corridors that keep Hezbollah in the fight? Can Israel still strike weapons flows, command nodes, and rearmament infrastructure there under the terms of this deal? A framework that manages the border while leaving Hezbollah’s rear areas intact may reduce friction without meaningfully changing the balance of power in Lebanon.
There is also the view from northern Israel. If residents of Kiryat Shmona, Metula, Manara, and other border communities still believe Hezbollah can rebuild observation posts, restore launch capacity, or prepare another frontier shock, displaced Israelis will not return simply because a framework exists. They will only return if the facts on the ground change, visibly and durably.
The Lebanese side faces an equally hard political problem. Hezbollah’s power inside Shia communities rests on welfare provision, patronage, identity, coercion, and deep disillusionment with the Lebanese state. If Lebanon is serious about replacing Hezbollah’s order with state authority, it has to offer more than checkpoints, and foreign-backed security plans. It has to offer protection, services, and a political alternative that does not leave communities feeling exposed.
People Power. Defiant of Iran-backed Hezbollah, a poster depicting Lebanon’s President Joseph Aoun that reads ”The decision-maker, the protector of Lebanon, Lebanon first…The State always. We are with you” hangs at the entrance of a tunnel on a street in eastern Beirut on April 28, 2026. (Photo: Joseph EID / AFP via Getty Images)
So, yes: this is progress. A signed Israel-Lebanon framework after 44 years is not nothing, and the pilot-zone model gives the parties something concrete to test. The right posture, however, is cautious scepticism. The success of this deal depends on enforcement, verification, Israeli freedom of action, LAF capacity, Hezbollah’s coercive response, Iran’s tolerance for strategic loss, and Lebanon’s ability to offer its Shia citizens something better than the status quo. Until those details are clear, this is a good first step but it is not yet a settlement.
About the writer:
A veteran of three grueling tours of Afghanistan, Major Andrew Fox holds a Batchelor’s degree in Law & Politics, a Master’s in Military History & War Studies, Msc in Psychology and is currently studying for a PhD in History.
*Feature picture: ‘Sign’ of the Times. The historic signing of the Israel-Lebanon-U.S. “Trilateral Framework Agreement” is intended to contribute to regional transformation by envisioning an eventual normalization of relations between the two states of Israel and Lebanon. (Photo: AP Photo/Kevin Wolf)
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).
An upcoming exhibition in South Africa will reveal through personal testimonies, an extraordinary life whose legacy is enshrined for eternity in the young lives he saved in Eastern Europe in 1921. It’s an example for Jews today everywhere.
In December, 2026, the SA Jewish Museum in Cape Town, South Africa will host an exhibition on one of the finest and heroic chapters of the South African Jewish community – the life and times of Capetonian, Isaac Ochberg (1879-1938).
Entrepreneur, philanthropist, community leader and Zionist, Isaac Ochberg in 1921 mobilized communal Jewish support, obtained government permission through his friendship with Prime Minister Jan Smuts and then single-handedly, went into the most dangerous region in the world for Jews beset by war, pogroms, rampant antisemitism and a typhoid epidemic – to rescue Jewish orphans from certain death.
Even death did not stop Isaac Ochberg saving Jews.
Leaving the largest bequest in History to the JNF-KKL following his death in 1938, the proceeds were used to support higher education at universities in preparation for the future Jewish state (notably the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Weizmann Institute) and acquire the land that became kibbutz Dalia and kibbutz Galed, that would, following WWII, absorb the survivors of the Shoah. It is no wonder that there stands today in the Megiddo region, the Isaac Ochberg Park that has a ‘Hill of Names’ enshrining the names of all the orphan children he saved.
Today, thousands of their descendants are today spread around the globe and in preparation for the exhibition, the SA Jewish Museum is seeking to trace as many of them to document the never-ending enriching saga of Isaac Ochberg. For further information see details at the end of the article below on the Ochberg saga by French historian, Michel Levine.
David E. Kaplan Chairman of the Isaac Ochberg Heritage Committee (Israel) Editor of Lay of the Land
THE ODYSSEY OF THE OCHBERG ORPHANS
How one South African businessman in 1921 set out by himself, risking life and limb to save Jewish orphans in worn-torn Eastern Europe
By Michel Levine
What drove Isaac Ochberg, a respectable and prosperous South African businessman, in 1920 to undertake an adventurous expedition thousands of kilometers to the north, into a Europe plunged into the bloody turmoil of civil wars?
For him, things were undoubtedly simple: born Jewish in Ukraine, he had been fortunate enough to flee the hell that awaited him to live under different skies. This chance, he wanted to offer in turn to the most vulnerable children: the orphans.
Isaac Ochberg was born in 1878 in Russia, into a Jewish family of German origin with six children, in the small town of Uman (now Ukrainian) located in what was then known as the “Pale of Settlement”. Created by Empress Catherine II in 1791, this was a vast area stretching from the Baltic to the Black Sea, including Ukraine, Lithuania, Latvia, Moldova, Belarus, Crimea, and part of Poland. When Isaac Ochberg was born, the situation of the five million Jews living there was hardly enviable. Excluded from public service and higher education, they had gathered in certain city neighborhoods or in small towns called shtetls. Forbidden to own land, they survived by practicing small trades, commerce, crafts, tavern management, but also pawnbroking, this last activity arousing resentment among the Orthodox common people who had only emerged from serfdom in 1861.
Man with a Mission. Isaac Ochberg (1878-1937) Ukrainian-born South African businessman, Jewish community leader, savior of Jewish orphans in Eastern Europe and passionate supporter of a Jewish State in Palestine.
Young Isaac was three years old when the assassination of Tsar Alexander II triggered a series of pogroms that led to a massive exodus. About two million Jews emigrated between 1881 and 1914, mainly to the United States. But it was to South Africa, this land said to also offer a new El Dorado, that his father Aaron decided to emigrate.
He arrived in 1893 in a peaceful country, although sporadically shaken by wars between the Boers, descendants of Dutch settlers, and the British. South Africa was then open to significant immigration following the discovery of gold and diamonds in the Transvaal and welcoming to Jews, a small community of whom had been settled in Cape Town since 1841, living mainly from commerce and crafts while maintaining their distinctiveness. More interested in studying the Talmud than in financial success, Aaron nevertheless managed, after two years, to gather sufficient funds to bring Isaac, his eldest son aged sixteen, who risked being conscripted into the army at any moment for a duration of six long years during which he would be exposed to the worst harassment as a Jew. Upon his arrival in his new homeland, young Isaac demonstrated his talent. Inventive and resourceful, he soon abandoned the watchmaking apprenticeship his father had intended for him to launch into business – all sorts of businesses according to his capricious inspiration, ranging from scrap metal recovery to ship salvaging, passing through coffee sales, gold prospecting in the Transvaal, or creating Cape Town’s first cinema. During this period, he made a trip to Russia to visit his ailing mother and took the opportunity to be exempted from military service due to defective vision. He also met Pauline, a friend of his sisters, whom he married before returning to Cape Town with the entire family.
At forty, with an established fortune, father of five children, and an honorable British citizen (the country had been a dominion since 1910), Isaac Ochberg led the life of a notable. An executive member of the Council of Jewish Deputies, representing his country at the 16th World Zionist Conference in Zurich, he participated in managing organizations to help children and orphans in particular – in this capacity, he had participated in founding the Cape Jewish orphanage, of which he became President. It was undoubtedly this last function that led him to become acutely aware of the dramatic situation of Jewish orphans living in Eastern Europe.
Key Coordinator. 26-year-old Alexander Bobrow (above) was a key player in assembling the orphans making it easier for Ochberg logistically, accompanied – at the children’s crying insistence – the orphans and Ochberg on the ship to Cape Town planning on returning to Eastern Europe. He never did, and his daughter Liebe would later marry Aaron Klug who would receive the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1982.
At the end of the First World War, from 1917 onwards, Russia had been the theater of a civil war between the Bolshevik “Red” armies and the Tsarist “Whites,” the latter supported by contingents of French and British soldiers. The situation worsened in 1919 when the Second Polish Republic undertook a war of territorial reconquest against Soviet Russia. At the same time, Lithuania, Ukraine, and Belarus were the scene of independence uprisings. While these ideological and nationalist forces, mixed with bands of looters, fought each other, they attacked a common prey: the zhid (the kike). For the “Reds”, although the new regime had abolished Tsarist antisemitic laws and promoted Yiddish as the Jewish national language (while nevertheless proscribing Hebrew, deemed bourgeois and Zionist), this representative of capitalism, “stateless” and “reactionary”, remained a class enemy. For the Tsarist “Whites”, driven by ancestral hatred, he had become the “Judeo-Bolshevik” embodied in the person of the Jew Trotsky and held responsible for all the misfortunes of Holy Russia. As their supreme weapon, the “Whites” brandished the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, this forgery manufactured by the political police, the Cheka, which they would then spread in Western Europe during their flight. For the bands of starving peasants, encouraged to revolt by Tsarist forces, the greedy Jew was designated as the absolute culprit, the one who had “killed Christ” and engaged in ritual murders of Christian children, as an ancestral rumor maintained. This justified massacring him and his family and seizing his property. Of the five million Jews residing in the Pale of Settlement (officially abolished in 1917 by the Bolshevik government), more than one hundred thousand had perished, two hundred thousand survived wounded or disabled, and there were more than 150,000 orphans. A 1919 report by the great American Jewish charitable organization the Joint (American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee) testified:
“In Poland, suffering is intense. There are institutions for children deprived of a morsel of bread, hospitals unusable due to lack of doctors, nurses, and medicines, despite an enormous number of diseases. A large percentage of people have been kept alive thanks to soup consisting of water, potatoes, and a little salt.”
Many voices rose up around the world to denounce these crimes. In London and New York, in particular, meetings and demonstrations were organized in which Jewish veterans of the Great War participated prominently. Under pressure from the Committee of Jewish Delegations, the 1919 Paris Peace Conference ordered a vast inquiry whose reports led to launching an “Appeal to Humanity” signed by great names such as Anatole France, Henri Barbusse, Elie Faure, and Albert Thomas.
President Wilson expressed his distress:
“One of the things that troubles peace in the world is the persecution of the Jews.”
He ordered the creation of a commission led by Henry Morgenthau, future minister under President Roosevelt, to investigate the pogroms in Poland (this work could only be carried out in that country, as the new Soviet government had forbidden entry to its territory). This commission traveled through battlefields and mass graves and published upon its return an alarming report on the fate of Jewish minorities. A commission led by Sir Stuart M. Samuel, British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, succeeded it, at the initiative of the representative council of Jews in the United Kingdom. This one in turn denounced the scandalous situation. But these accumulating reports were not followed by action because, lacking a state to represent them, Jews were considered a minority among others, deprived as such of any real political power.
In South Africa, during an extraordinary meeting of the South African Relief Fund, a Jewish organization to aid war victims, Isaac Ochberg proposed that the Cape Jewish Orphanage he had been directing for several years organize a mission to “rescue” endangered Jewish orphans who would then be brought to the country. Certainly, he was aware that this mission close to his heart could only save a very limited number of children, but these would be lives preserved. “Whoever saves one life saves the world,” Isaac argued, citing the Talmud to support his proposal. His project was accepted – it remained to obtain the endorsement of the authorities. Prime Minister Jan Smuts, his friend, submitted his project to the government. Good news: Although immigration was strictly limited at that time, the response was positive, with some reservations. Entry visas would be issued to the orphans, but according to very precise criteria: there would be no more than two hundred, not exceeding 16 years of age, they must be in good physical and moral health, have lost both parents, and finally brothers and sisters could not be separated to avoid emotional problems. All, finally, must express their will to participate in this journey. Heavy-hearted at the idea that he would have to select among these children and abandon some to their fate, Isaac accepted these conditions – we will see that he would interpret them in his own way… What saddened him most was this cut-off figure of 200. He discussed, negotiated, and obtained that after this trip, if things went well, the State would consider repeating the operation. As for financing, it was decided that the Jewish community would bear half the cost. This was a significant commitment, as it would have to assume the costs of the journey, the maintenance and care of the 200 children, and then, once they arrived in Africa, the costs of their accommodation in orphanages, some until they came of age if they were not fortunate enough to be adopted by families.
Saga of Salvation. South African Prime Minister Jan Smuts (top left) who granted Isaac Ochberg (top right) permission to bring into South Africa 200 rescued Jewish orphans from Eastern Europe. (centre) Isaac Ochberg disembarking with his rescued orphans who throughout their lives would refer to him as “Daddy Ochberg”. (Botton left and right) Passport photos of some of the 187 rescued orphans brought to South Africa.
Assisted by the South African Aid Fund for Jewish War Victims, Isaac then launched a campaign across the country, personally traveling through cities and villages to organize public meetings followed by fundraising collections. During this fundraising, critical voices were heard in the Jewish community:
– Would this expedition, conducted in countries at war, not endanger the children concerned?
– Would their arrival in the country not risk being experienced as a provocation by certain conservative Christian circles, the National Party in particular, when South Africa was experiencing an economic crisis?
Some suggested it would be wiser to send these foreign children to the Yishuv (the Jewish community in Palestine). Isaac remained deaf to what he considered submission to intolerance and continued his project.
Soon good news reached him: the fundraising campaign had raised sums far exceeding the expected figures. Dr. Jochelman, president of the federation of Ukrainian Jews in London, had let it be known that his organization was willing to house the orphans and handle their embarkation for South Africa.
On March 18, 1921, in Cape Town, Isaac Ochberg embraced his family, greeted the children of the orphanage, and amid a large gathering that came to encourage him and wish him a good journey, boarded the steamship that would take him to London.
Expected duration of the expedition: seven months.
TUMULTUOUS TRANSITION
Upon his arrival in the British capital, Isaac learned that the political situation in Eastern Europe had profoundly changed while he was sailing across the ocean. Russia and Poland had just signed a treaty in Riga that granted the latter numerous territories, the Kresy Wschodnie (“Eastern borderlands”) which included parts of Belarus, Lithuania, and Ukraine. This meant that all the cities constituting the stages of the planned journey were now under Polish administration and that the hard-won Soviet safe-conduct was now worthless.
Fortunately, the great explorer Fridtjof Nansen was passing through London. President of the League of Nations High Commission for Refugees, he had just created the first international identity document, the “Nansen passport”, a document which from 1922 would protect hundreds of thousands of wandering “displaced persons“, driven by conflicts and incessant border redrawings. During his meeting with the great man, Isaac explained his project to him. Nansen was enthusiastic. He managed to obtain from the new masters of Poland, whom he knew were concerned about international recognition, a safe-conduct authorizing Isaac to travel through the country with the benevolent assistance of local authorities. But as for the orphans, now Polish, how to obtain authorization to take them out of the country? Nansen obtained a commitment from Polish authorities that they would issue them special identity papers: “collective Nansen passports”.
On May 18, 1921, Isaac began his journey. Paris first, where Dr. Boris Borgen, head of the Joint, provided him with authorizations for the heads of orphanages under his organization so that they would entrust Isaac with the residents he had chosen. Next stop, Warsaw. In the capital of the Second Polish Republic that the Treaty of Versailles had brought back from its ashes in 1919, Isaac hoped to obtain help and assistance without too much illusion however – after all, he was just a Zhid (Slavic pejorative term for a Jew) who had appeared from nowhere…
In Warsaw, the ‘Jewish metropolis’ (Di Yidishe metropolye), the Joint officials, who managed most of the country’s orphanages, described to him the difficult relations they maintained with victorious Poland. Certainly, its government had ratified in 1920 the treaty annexed to that of Versailles concerning minorities, but nationalist parties accused Jews of having sided with the Bolsheviks during hostilities while the Catholic hierarchy continued to pursue them with its ancestral hatred. This hostility manifested itself through restrictions on credits to orphanages and rationing of their medical protection. Many of these establishments survived only thanks to the help of the Joint or local charitable organizations like Tzedakah Gedolah – which led some non-Jewish orphans to say:
“Those bastard zhids, they’re lucky to have other zhids to come to their aid.”
Isaac organized his journey. The large and small cities he would have to visit drew a vast triangle with 400-kilometer sides. First in the north, Brest-Litovsk, then Pinsk, then descent towards Sarny, Kowel, and Rovno to Lvov, finally return to Warsaw where all the chosen children would be gathered, whose state of health would have allowed them to contemplate the journey. Hence the necessity of adding a certain number of round trips to the route. Given the poor state of communications due to the war, he had planned to use trains that were still running, otherwise buses or trucks. He did not yet know that he would also have to use horse-drawn carts.
Flourishing Future. The last surviving Ochberg orphan Cissy Harris, who died at the age of 102 in Modi’in, Israel, is seen here planting a tree at the opening of the Isaac Ocberg Park in 2011 marking the 90 anniversary of the heroic rescue. She is supported by Maish Isaacson (left), chairman of Telfed and Bennie Penzik, whose both parents were orphans rescued by Ochberg.
CHILDREN OF MISFORTUNE
On August 24, the orphans had barely settled into the premises of the Shelter for Jewish Poor located in the East End when representatives of the British and international press appeared. Extracting children from a turbulent and dangerous Europe, often saving their lives, was a bold move that surprised them and that they were very eager to make known. Gathered in a room, the orphans were presented to journalists. They stood properly, under the flashes. Isaac, surrounded by officials, answered questions. He made it a duty to insist on the role played by charitable organizations and the support of the South African government. He also pleaded for other countries to take over and welcome other children.
Preparation for the journey to Cape Town was organized. It was a long trip and the children had to be in good physical shape and not be carriers of diseases that might contaminate other passengers. Medical examinations followed one another. Numerous cases of anemia were detected, which would not prevent embarkation, but also more serious conditions, which required hospitalizing some children. The latter would remain in London, which was a great heartbreak for them, but they could keep hope that soon a new voyage to Cape Town would come get them, or that other countries would decide to welcome them. Doctors and nurses were hired for the journey.
On September 2, children and companions took the train to Southampton where the steamship Edinburgh Castle awaited them.
Destination – Cape Town.
Past Preserved. Erin Kumin from Ra’anana, Israel, points to the plaque of her great-grandmother, Janie Odes, one of the orphans saved by Isaac Ochberg in 1921 at centenary event at the Ochberg Park on the 12 March 2021. (Photo D.E. Kaplan)
THE CROSSING
The children were at first afraid of this dark and vibrating mass, then got used to it. The large steamship offered them an enclosed space, a playground, where they loved to run, but under supervision, because their vitality led them to often bump into chimneys, ropes, and in narrow passages. At night, they laughed and cried too, fought with pillows. The sailors, of various nationalities, were very friendly – some told them stories about their country, incredible stories. As for the cooks, they were reluctant to prepare this complicated kosher food but complied with the instructions.
Nurses and doctors had their work cut out for them monitoring big and small ailments and seasickness. They drew their medicines from a large carefully arranged pharmacy. One of the children had mumps, which required special care during a stopover.
The companions organized games. On deck, the wind rushed into their clothes and made the little caps they had been given at departure fly, some flew away and came to float on the waves. The passengers, sometimes jostled, were mostly touched and moved by the story the children had lived through, and they applauded the ‘God Save the King’ that they sometimes sang, with a very particular accent.
Field of Dreams. Ochberg dreamt of a green fertile Israel such as this field with youngsters cycling at the Ochberg Park, Megiddo.(Courtesy Megiddo Regional Council)
THE PROMISED LAND
After a 17- day crossing, early in the morning, the children grouped on deck saw lights blinking on the horizon on a gray land planted with misty and dark mountains. The sailors pointed out the curiously flat summit, called Table Mountain. The boat approached and soon the children distinguished more precisely people who had come to welcome them carrying flowers and brandishing welcome banners in Yiddish. These people had white skin, others black, it really was Africa…
As the ship docked, the children broke into a song than was joined by people on the quay. Everyone knew the words, so moving in these circumstances:
“Hinei ma tov u’ma nayim Shevet achim gam Yachad” (“Behold, how good and how pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity! “). Greeted by the cheers of a crowd in tears, the children disembarked. “Until my last day,” Fanny Frier would write, a little girl who would later become president of the Cape orphanage, “I will never forget the first time we saw the lights of Cape Town, then the wonderful welcome we received when we disembarked, when half the city apparently awaited us on the quay.”
‘Hill of Names’. Visitors to the Isaac Ochberg Park in Megiddo, Israel look closely at the plaques of all the known names of the orphans Isaac Ochberg rescued and brought safely to South Africa.
NEW LAND, NEW LIFE
What would become of these little beings thus projected into this new world? Taken in and raised in the two orphanages Oranjia in Cape Town and Arcadia in Johannesburg and some, not many, would be adopted by families where they would live their childhood surrounded by attention and love. Then they would set out to conquer the vast world to experience the most diverse destinies. Almost all would have children, often numerous.
Alive Because of One Man. Descendants of Ochberg orphans from all over the world attend the inauguration of the Ochberg Park, Megiddo in 2011 are seen here at nearby Kibbutz Gal’ed, founded in 1945 by members of Habonim from Germany. The kibbutz was built on land purchased by the JNF-KKL from the Isaac Ochberg bequest. (Photo: D.E. Kaplan)
For years, their descendants, who now number several thousand, have ritually gathered to celebrate with emotion the anniversary of their arrival and the memory of Daddy Ochberg, the “man from Africa” who came to get them before the Shoah exterminated most of the other Jewish children who remained in Europe.
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.)
*Feature Picture:Savior of Children. Isaac Ochberg (centre) with Jewish children at an orphanage in Eastern Europe.
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).
Beset by internal social strife, South Africa indulges in cheap scapegoating blaming Israel – Is anyone surprised?
By Marika Sboros
So, Israel, the world’s most overworked, overused and abused scapegoat, is the “hidden hand” behind South Africa’s latest xenophobia crisis.
Of course, it is. If you believe the latest conspiracy theory to emerge recently from the fever swamps of South African social media.
But has Israel really been orchestrating South Africa’s xenophobic violence – or “afrophobia”, as activists and academics in the refugee and migration space now call it?
ProtectingAfricans from South Africans. The South African police during a protest against illegal immigrants organised by March and March in Goodwood, a Cape Town suburb, on May 30, 2026. (Photo: Roger Bosch/AFP)
And if so, why and how would tiny Israel find time and inclination in its hectic military schedule despite fighting ongoing wars back home, including against the Iranian behemoth?
In retaliation, apparently, for South Africa taking Israel to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in December 2023, on a genocide in Gaza charge. Or so the theory holds.
Israel could be understandably miffed at South Africa lodging its ICJ case “urgently” within weeks of a genuine genocidal attack by Hamas on October 7, 2023. That urgency speedily dissipated, and South Africa’s case has proved ill-judged.
Its own lawyers recently requested and were granted an extraordinary 18-month extension. This means that its written submissions won’t be completed until 2029.
Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs was unsparing on X:
“This case was never about the facts. It has always been a propaganda campaign by South Africa in the service of Hamas, masquerading as a legal process.”
One local Facebook “influencer” said the xenophobic violence would disappear “like the night when the sun rises” if South Africa dropped its ICJ case.
A pan-Africanist Facebook group claimed that Israelis were poised to swoop into South Africa, destabilise it from within by pushing Black Africans “to the margins” and to rebuild it “in their own image.” With a little help from friends in “Western powers” (aka the US).
That led critics to suggest that the conspiracy theory is aimed as much at US as Israeli “hidden hands”.
“HOME-GROWN’ HIDDEN HANDS
Yet accusing Israel of trying to destabilise South Africa from within describes precisely what years of ANC governance have actually done after more than 30 years since “liberation”. From within. By its own hand.
The hidden hand has always been home-grown.
If Soviet-Jewish writer and war correspondent Vasily Grossman were around, he’d say:
“Tell me what you accuse Jews of and I’ll tell you what you’re guilty of.”
It’s the closing line of a longer passage in his novel, Life and Fate, where he argues that antisemitism is never an end in itself. Rather, it is a mirror for the failings of individuals, social structures and state systems.
With those words and a novelist’s precision, Grossman captured what psychologists call “projection”. It is the mechanism by which people and institutions attribute to others the very impulses, failures and crimes they cannot face in themselves.
Their accusations are not random, say psychologists. They are often confessions.
Accuse Jews of controlling the world through money and fear, and you may be the one controlling through precisely those means. Or you may be helpfully deflecting attention from the real controllers.
A South African example of that projection is in a speech by Dr Imtiaz Sooliman, founder and CEO of Gift of the Givers, a local charity acknowledged globally for its humanitarian disaster-relief work.
On October 5, 2023, Sooliman addressed an anti-Israel rally in Cape Town beneath a banner declaring “We Are All Hamas”. He said, in his own words, that:
“…They (Zionists) run the world with fear. They control the world with money.”
He attempted to pre-empt accountability by saying antisemitism charges are just tools to silence criticism of Israel. However, while there is plenty to criticise in Israel’s government and its policies, genocide and apartheid are not part of that legitimate critique. As legal scholars across the world (not all of them Jews) say.
And antisemitic tropes are tropes, whatever political cover is thrown over them.
PROTOCOLS REVISITED
Sooliman’s language feeds into the core premise of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. That’s an enduring publication, which the Russian Tsarist secret police fabricated between 1898 and 1903. It purported to be the minutes of a secret meeting of Jewish leaders plotting world domination through control of global financial systems, governments and media.
The Times of London exposed it as a clumsy, plagiarised forgery in 1921. That did not dent its popularity. If anything, it became even more popular. Hitler cited it. Henry Ford distributed 500,000 copies of it across the US. It is still in print.
Sooliman’s declaration is one of the oldest tropes in the Jew-hater’s lexicon. It feeds off the original “blood libel” – the term for the claim that Jews kill Christian children to drink their blood in religious ritual. It dates back to the 12th century.
It is testimony to Jew hatred’s enduring power that both claims have retained their power into the 21st century. It is, after all, the world’s oldest hatred. (Call it “antisemitism”, if you prefer that 19th-century, pseudo-scientific euphemism coined by Jew-haters themselves to make their loathing sound respectable.)
Jew hatred has helped to make “Zionist” the anti-Israel lobby’s preferred code word for Jew. Lobbyists deploy Zionist as a swear word for Jew and a deliberate strategy to avoid detection of hate speech online. Social media platforms are slow to close the loophole because the distinction between legitimate criticism of Israeli government policy and antisemitic conspiracy theory dressed up as political commentary is notoriously difficult to police at scale.
Perhaps the most common and ironic example of projection in modern times is the ubiquitous accusation that Jews, aka “Zionists”, have committed genocide in Gaza. There can be no worse accusation to make against victims of actual genocide than to accuse them wrongly of being perpetrators of it.
That is projection in its most naked form.
DARK GLOBAL TRADITION
Hamas’s charter is explicitly genocidal towards Jews. Hamas political bureau member Ghazi Hamad declared on Lebanese TV on October 24, 2023, that October 7 was “just the first time and there will be a second, a third, a fourth” until Israel’s existence “finished”.
And while this is a South African story, it sits in a very long, very dark global tradition. It includes the latest mutation of Jew hatred with documentation over 900 years old.
Jew hatred has caused pogroms, mass expulsions of entire communities from countries Jews had lived in for generations, and the systematic murder of six million Jews.
The accusations change. The consequences for targets stay the same.
Post-October 7, Jews are being savagely attacked worldwide and killed just for being Jews. As the title of US author Dara Horn’s book bleakly notes, People Love Dead Jews.
October 7 is where nine centuries of Jew hatred, unchecked and unashamed, have ultimately led.
Yet October 7 denialism is rife. Some critics deny that Hamas committed atrocities on October 7.
They call it “resistance”;
They say that Israel “had it coming”;
that it was a “false flag” or “psyop” (psychological operation), in which Israel staged the massacre of its own civilians to gain sympathy and justify genocide on Palestinians in Gaza.
That is Holocaust denial in real time.
It raises the question of where this conspiracy theory linking Israel to xenophobic violence began.
Mzoxolo Mpolase, managing editor of Political Analysis South Africa, did some forensic work in an article on his website on May 27. He traces the conspiracy theory to a single January 2026 post in the Times of Israel’s open blog section, a platform for third-party contributors with no implied editorial endorsement.
WHERE IT ALL BEGAN
The author is a former South African, Grant Gochin, now based in California, USA, where he is a writer, financial advisor and serves as the Honorary Consul for the Republic of Togo in West Africa.
Gochin argued that African states are trapped by colonial borders and that South Africa should fragment into smaller sovereign entities. That was his opinion, nothing more, as Mpolase notes.
That’s where the chain of evidence ends, as Mpolase notes.
Gochin posits no funding channel, instruction or organisational relationship between Israel, its government’s policy and South Africa’s xenophobic or afrophobic protests.
Seth Mandel, writing in Commentary Magazine on June 11, 2026, identifies an “emerging, seemingly iron rule” about accusations against Israel that may help to explain the real dynamic behind the conspiracy theory.
“Pay attention to the when, and you’ll figure out the why.” He could have been channelling Grossman.
Mandel gives four notable items, including a column in TheNew York Times on May 11, with “wild accusations that Israel is training dogs to rape Palestinian inmates, along with uncorroborated allegations of state-sanctioned abuse.”
On May 12, a major commission released a two-year catalogue of evidence showing that Hamas used mass rape and sexual torture as a key weapon of its military strategy on October 7 and after.
That made the timing of the Times piece, in pre-empting the results of an actual investigation into Hamas, “suddenly clear”, as Mandel notes.
Grossman saw the mechanism in 1960. Mandel documented it in real time.
It is all the more disturbing, then, that South African government ministers at the highest levels and respected NGOs (non-governmental organisations) have enthusiastically helped to spread the hidden-hands conspiracy theory.
Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola gave the keynote address at a symposium co-hosted by DIRCO (Department of International Relations and Cooperation) and the South African Institute of International Affairs in Cape Town on May 25, 2026. He condemned the xenophobic violence strongly and took care not to mention Israel by name.
He undid that good work by saying that “with the current geo-political environment, and South Africa’s role in the international space, including our case at the ICJ, you cannot exclude state and non-state actors trying to erode the human-rights standing of South Africa.”
That was a dog whistle with a foghorn attached.
Master Manipulator. Giving the keynote address at a symposium co-hosted by DIRCO in Cape Town on May 25, 2026, South African Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola condemned the xenophobic violence taking place in his country and although not mentioning Israel by name, implied such by stating that with “our case at the ICJ,” against Israel, “you cannot exclude state and non-state actors trying to erode the human-rights standing of South Africa.”
PROPAGANDA TV CHANNEL
Prominent refugee and migration academics and activists in South Africa have amplified it. Chief among them is Julie Eccles, a public face of Kopanang Africa Against Xenophobia (KAAX).
KAAX is a broad, grassroots civil-society coalition that claims to advocate for pan-African solidarity and constitutional rights for everyone, regardless of nationality or legal status.
Seeking Safety. Far removed from Israel, a man sits with a blanket to keep warm as thousands of Malawians take refuge on June 20, 2026 in Sherwood Park outside Durban, South Africa. Around 12,000 people have passed through the camp in recent weeks, seeking safety amid intimidation campaigns by anti-migrant South African groups. (Photo: Per-Anders Pettersson/Getty Images)
Everyone except “Zionists”, apparently, in Eccles’s book.
She appeared on a Salaam Media panel on June 3, with Sharon Ekambaram, KAAX co-founder and head of Refugee and Migrant Rights at Lawyers for Human Rights, Prof Loren Landau, professor of migration and development at the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa, and Oxford University in the UK, and Mthunzi Mdwaba, a controversial South African businessman and legal academic.
The panel’s topic was Xenophobia in South Africa: Is There a Hidden Hand Stirring the Chaos?
On live TV, Eccles named a “hidden hand”, Martin Moshal, who she described as “an Israeli billionaire” and “dyed-in-the-wool Zionist.” She said that he had donated “at least R40-million to Action SA”, a party that “doesn’t even have a seat in parliament,” and “talks openly” about turning South Africa into “whatever his vision is.”
She got most of that wrong. Whether by default or design, neither reflects well on her or KAAX.
Action SA has six seats in Parliament. Moshal is South African, born and raised in Durban, currently living in Sydney, Australia. He is a venture capitalist, a philanthropist, and the largest known donor to opposition parties in South Africa, including the DA (Democratic Alliance), Action SA, the IFP (Inkatha Freedom Party) and BOSA (Build One South Africa).
Singing for Salvation. While a man plays his guitar as thousands of Malawians take refuge on June 20, 2026 in Sherwood Park outside Durban, South Africa, certain leaders in South Africa try play a different tune pointing a finger of blame at Israel. (Photo: Anders Pettersson/Getty Images)
Eccles said none of that. Instead, she played by the anti-Israel lobby’s rule book of injecting Jewish figures as shadowy puppet masters into local disputes and manufacturing foreign conspiracies where no logical connection exists.
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Mdwaba declared himself “happy” that Eccles had “mentioned Israeli elements.” That was his loud dog whistle to scapegoat Israel as a hostile actor behind the xenophobic violence.
Landau, whose reputation at Wits and Oxford universities rests on rigorous, evidence-based analysis, could have challenged and corrected Eccles’ claims in seconds. He said nothing about her misrepresentations. Neither did Ekambaram.
Salaam Media, a Johannesburg-based media agency and radio station that claims to be committed to “humanitarian journalism”, could have included at least one dissenting voice on the panel. There were none. The question in the panel’s title was rhetorical, and the answer decided before the cameras rolled.
That is not journalism. It is propaganda.
The ANC’s support for the Palestinian cause is the main backdrop to the conspiracy theory. It remains rooted in its history of solidarity with anti-colonial liberation movements, regardless of how violently extreme.
The apartheid smear against Israel drives much of its rhetoric. Some South Africans who actually lived under apartheid recognise and reject it as a propaganda weapon. Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East. Its Arab citizens vote, sit in the Knesset and serve on the Supreme Court.
That is not apartheid.
And South Africa is no stranger to strains of afrophobic violence. Since “liberation” in 1994, there have been at least six major waves of such violence against Black African migrants. The worst came in May 2008, when 62 people died, some were left burning alive in the streets, and over 100,000 were displaced.
Since October 7, the response from some ministers, including President Cyril Ramaphosa, has been sartorial. They don a Palestinian scarf in public and ignore deepening potholes in the country’s literal and figurative roads.
The formula for scapegoating Jews has not changed globally in 900 years.
The accusation is always a confession. The charge is always a mirror. And the target is always the same.
US Representative Ritchie Torres put it bluntly on X in 2024, after Iran’s Supreme Leader praised American campus protesters against Israel:
“When … the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism and antisemitism … praises you, you have become useful idiots on the wrong side of history.”
Show South Africa’s scapegoating, hidden-hand conspiracy theorists anything remotely close to a peace sign, and they will still see a clenched fist.
They may think they are on the right side of history by demonising Israel and Jews who support it. If they keep going – and they most likely will – their place is secure as useful idiots on history’s wrong side.
*Feature photo: Recuring violence against foreigners from across Africa is now the norm in South Africa. Seen here foreign nationals holding a placard during an anti-xenophobia march outside the City Hall of Durban on April 8, 2015 where the protestors marched against anti-immigrant violence, a week after hundreds were viciously attacked. (Photo credit should read RAJESH JANTILAL/AFP via Getty Images).
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).
Giving in to Iranian demands rather than achieve peace in the Middle East will instead facilitate perpetual war.
By Neville Berman
After publicly assuring the Iranian people, “Help is on the way”, Trump decided that America needed to do a deal with the world’s greatest exporter of terror and perennial liar about its nuclear program. Consequently, the Iranian regime has been given a lifeline.
Following the slaughter of tens of thousands of its own protesting citizens and Trump’s assurances, the US president has turned his back on the Iranian people who want democracy, freedom of expression, the rule of law, and human rights.
Misleading Message. “Help is on its way,” Trump tells Iranians as he urges them to keep protesting in January, 2026.
Initially, America held all the cards. The situation has now changed. The whole world is complaining about the increase in the price of petrol and gas. America does not want to be at war while it is co-hosting the soccer world cup. Once the tournament ends, campaigning for the midterm elections will take center stage. Americans are tired of fighting wars of choice in foreign lands thousands of miles away. Trump wants to end the war and be recognized as a peacemaker. In addition, Congress has not agreed to give Trump the green light to continue with the war.
The Iranian regime knows that it can rely on help from China and Russia. Russia is using thousands of drones supplied by Iran in its war against Ukraine, and Russia will veto any UN Security Council resolution calling for sanctions on Iran. They also know that China will buy billions of dollars of Iranian oil at a discount. The regime also knows that it has the backing of Qatar, and that it can rely on the Europeans to seek appeasement no matter the cost.
Twenty percent of the world’s oil exports flow through the Strait of Hormuz on Iran’s southern coastline. The Strait is an international waterway that should remain open and never be subject to tariffs. Nobody has to pay to use the English Channel and nobody should ever have to pay to use the Strait of Hormuz. Closing the Strait of Hormuz is against international law, but the Iranian regime knows that no Iranian has ever been charged by the International Criminal Court for committing any crime. The bottom line is that Iran is already planning a massive victory parade.
The Iranian regime is going for the jugular and when Pakistan was accepted as the venue for negotiations, it was a dead cert that America would bow to Iranian demands.
The world’s greatest superpower would no longer be calling the shots!
The Iranians are demanding :
the immediate lifting of American sanctions,
over $100 billion of frozen Iranian money in foreign banks to be released.
The right to impose fees on oil tankers passing through the “international waterway” of the Strait of Hormuz – amounting to an act of extortion.
$300 billion as compensation for war damage ignoring the war was caused by their own actions
removal of all US armed forces from the Middle East.
LostLeverage. With Pakistan the venue for negotiations, the US lost its edge and was no longer calling the shots.
To make matters worse, America is not insisting on restrictions on the Iranian missile program, nor is it insisting that Iran end its support for their proxy terrorist forces in the Middle East. In regard to the Iranian nuclear program, Iran is once again committing to allow the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)to inspect its nuclear program and its stockpile of enriched uranium. Iran had agreed to this in the past, and then lied and lied, and prevented the IAEA from carrying out what was agreed to. No matter what is agreed to in a new deal, Iran will continue to lie about its nuclear program in the future. The deal gives the Iranians everything upfront, and in return the US gets a commitment from Iran to end its nuclear program at some stage in the future. The Iranian regime is laughing all the way to the bank. They also have no intention of ever abandoning their nuclear program. Trump has completely lost the plot of what should be happening.
For over a decade Netanyahu warned the world about the danger of a nuclear armed Iran. Finally, when it came down to attempting to destroy the underground nuclear facilities in Iran, the US and Israel operated with an unprecedented level of partnership, co-operation and intelligence sharing. Together they significantly reduced the threat of Iran’s nuclear program and its capacity to wage war.
The Iranians have spent decades and billions of dollars financing, training and supplying Hezbollah with an estimated 150,000 rockets aimed at Israel. Using incredible intelligence capabilities, and innovative tactics, Israel eliminated the leadership of Hezbollah, and greatly reduced its capacity to attack Israel. Hezbollah still has a stockpile of anti-tank missiles and drones that they continue to shoot into Israel. Israel has replied by attacking Hezbollah facilities in Lebanon. The IDF have discovered massive amounts of armaments stored in civilian houses and underground tunnels in Lebanon.
The Iranians are trying to save Hezbollah. They are demanding that any deal between Iran and America must include a ceasefire in Lebanon. What this signifies is that Iran does not consider Lebanon to be a sovereign independent country. What Trump should be demanding is that Hezbollah disarm, so that Lebanon and Israel can then conclude a peace treaty and live in peace with each other. The problem in Lebanon is Hezbollah, and not the actions of Israel. Surprisingly, Trump has taken the side of the Iranians and has demanded that Israel implement a ceasefire in Lebanon. Israel has refused. Trump has now turned against Netanyahu with a vengeance. Israel has been totally locked out of the negotiations with the Iranians and Trump has turned Netanyahu into a pariah in the White House.
Money Talks. The talks are becoming a battle to unlock the funds.
What is actually happening is that America has agreed to a framework deal to be signed immediately, and that negotiations will then be held for a maximum of 60 days, in order to conclude a Memorandum of Understanding that will result in a permanent peace between the United States and Iran.
The world is cheering. Gas prices are going down, and Iran has promised not to build or buy atomic weapons. At long last, peace in the Middle East seems to be possible. What can go wrong?
In his second term, Trump believes – having repeatedly expressed so – he is deserving of the Nobel Peace Prize even though he has declared that:
– the US needs to own Greenland and would either take it the easy way or the hard way
– the US needs to take control of Canada, Mexico, Cuba, Panama, Venezuela, and the Gaza Strip
– signaled a cut back of American support to NATO.
While none of the above are likely to help Trump in his quest for the Nobel Peace Prize, if he does manage to bring ‘peace’ – that is, some modicum of a cessation of hostilities to the region, he just might receive it. However, what Trump is negotiating with Iran will not bring genuine peace for it will empower the leadership to renew all its nefarious terrorist activities and revitalize the fanatical religious obsession set on eliminating the State of Israel. Over 80% of Shiite Muslims in the world are known as Twelvers. They believe that the 12th Imam, Muhammad al-Mahdi, who disappeared in the 10th century, will one day reappear and bring Islamic rule and justice to the world. The Imams in charge of Iran believe that Israel needs to be eliminated in order to hasten his return. The general view of the Iranian people is that Israel has nothing to do with the return of the 12th Imam and that Iran and Israel should resume normal relations that existed before the revolution in 1979.
Trump’s Holy Grail. Speaking to reporters back in January 2026 at the White House, Donald Trump said he couldn’t “think of anybody in history that should get the Nobel Prize more than me.”
The deal that America is negotiating with Iran will ensure that perpetual war in the Middle East continues. Successive American administrations have never understood the Middle East, and the current administration is no exception.
There is another small minority viewpoint that holds that Trump is actually the most brilliant politician around, and that all his capricious behaviour is part of his master plan to ensure that America becomes great again. The theory is that Trump will get the Iranians to agree to a deal, and after that the Republican Party will win a majority in both the Senate and the House in the midterm elections. Iran will inevitably not keep to its commitments, and Trump will then get Congress to approve military action against the Iranian regime. He will once again partner with Israel, and together they will cause the Iranian regime to collapse and be overthrown. Netanyahu will be completely vindicated, and will be invited back to the White House to celebrate the fall of the Iranian regime. Hallelujah.
No matter what happens in Iran, and despite all the problems that Israel is facing, Israel will remain a democracy, and will continue to innovate and prosper. It will continue to ensure the rights of Christians, Muslims and members of various other religions to freely access and pray at their respective holy sites in Israel. It will continue to act as a light unto the nations of the world, and will play a positive role in improving the lives of tens of millions of people around the world. Millions of Jews have a yearning to live in the land promised by G-d to the seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The population of Israel will continue to grow. Empires have come and gone, but Israel is here to stay. I would not want to live anywhere else. One last thought, Trump will never receive a Nobel Peace Prize.
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).
Promises, platitudes and politics is all that is left on offer from Israel’s prime minister.
By David E. Kaplan
The story about the prophet Samuel informing King Saul that his kingdom was being taken away in favor of a more worthy successor, remains a pivotal moment in the biblical narrative about the wisdom of timeous political transition. (Samuel 15 and 16)
Some 3000 years later, this narrative could not be more instructive.
What if Samuel was with us today and like all Israelis on 16 June 2026, who turned on their local TV news channels to hear their prime minister address the nation on Trump’s MoU. (Memorandum of Understanding).
‘Deal’ with the Devil. In response to national anxiety over Trumps MoU, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu holds a press conference on the June 15, 2026, asserting that ‘we saved Israel from annihilation’ in war, admits he and Trump don’t always ‘see eye to eye,’ stresses troops will remain in south Lebanon and admits he does not know all the details of the deal. (Photo: Olivier Fitoussi/Pool)
After all, the issue is the number one existential issue facing the nation of Israel.
This is what the prime minister himself believes.
This is what he has been telling us and the world not for years but for decades. On this issue, he prides himself no less a prophet than Samuel.
So, what would Samuel have thought as he looked upon like all of us in disbelief?
What would he have wisely counseled while going about doing God’s work?
After so much war and suffering, did not the people of Israel deserve to hear at least some details from their prime minister to UNDERSTAND what was happening?
Bibi offered anything but UNDERSTANDING!
Well, not quite because we UNDERSTOOD that Bibi was as lost as all of us as the only relevant insight he could share on the MoU was that he did not know yet any details.
He let us know that we knew as much as he did.
Comforting!
As we prepared to watch Bibi’s carefully choreographed address, all were anxious having been subjected to the rumors that the agreement would:
– strengthen Hezbollah
– strengthen Iran and
– weaken Israel.
As we later learned, it did all three, virtually making Lebanon an Iranian protectorate. Bad enough for us in the center of the country but what of our fellow citizens in the north that as The Jerusalem Post editor solemnly writes would mean:
“…the difference between a family returning to Metula, Kiryat Shmona, Minara, Shlomi, or the Galilee, and another year of empty streets, shuttered businesses, improvised schooling and lives lived in suspension.”
Did the prime minister offer to them and the rest of his listening citizenry anything beyond, promises, platitudes and politics?
Like an ailing King Saul this was a failing “King Bibi” and that we, the modern citizens of Israel, needed fresh ideas and fresh leadership.
Displaying disdain for the concerns and anxieties of his people he hardly even addressed the MoU – the number one issue on all viewer’s minds and why they turned on their TVs to watch.
Desperate to hear some straight talk about what the burgeoning deal between the US and Iran would mean for us, all we got as most commentators agree was a superficial “campaign speech” using the platform to highlight Bibi’s military achievements and outlining future political goals.
Clearly, most pressing for Bibi was setting the record straight following a June 2026 interview, when U.S. President Donald Trump publicly questioned whether Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu intended to run in Israel’s upcoming fall elections, remarking “I wonder if Bibi even wants to continue.”
Soaking in the Spotlight. While Trump was enjoying his birthday week by parading his ‘Peace Deal’ with Iran at the G7 in France that sidelined Israel’s interests and concerns, Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu found himself adrift having few credible answers to an exhausted and skeptical citizenry that will in months be deciding his political future.
Bibi assured his viewers that he will be running and that “I intend to win.”
Hardly what many wanted to hear!
In a De Gaulle mode of Je suis la France (“I am France”), Bibi believes he is indispensable to Israel – that he embodies the Jewish State.
Having endured two major conflicts with the Iranian regime, spending hours in shelters as Iranian ballistic missiles rained down indiscriminately in attempts to kill as many Israeli civilians as possible, with lives lost, homes destroyed, and nerves frayed, Israelis deserved more.
They did not get it.
Where we did get the truth was from Trump’s former partner- in-chief during his first term, VP Mike Pence who blasted the U.S.-Iran MoU, warning it contains no requirement for Iran to dismantle its nuclear or ballistic missile programs and no commitment to end support for terror groups like Hamas and Hezbollah.
All issues critical to Israel, Pence said the deal would immediately ease sanctions, unlock billions in frozen Iranian assets, and pave the way for hundreds of billions in reconstruction funding for Iran, calling it “the kind of appeasement” seen under previous administrations.
Pense making Sense. Apart from Bibi not “seeing eye to eye” with his buddy Trump, neither did former U.S. VP, Mike Pence, who called the US-Ian MoU “the kind of appeasement” seen under previous administrations.
Days later, having time to “digest”, many in Israel felt a need to belch as the final memorandum appeared even worse than the leaked version, strengthening Iran’s hold over Lebanon, ignoring Hezbollah’s disarmament and exposing a seismic gap between Trump’s declarations and the agreement he signed. This deal sounds little more than extortion – paying Iran off to open Hormuz!
While all this is going on and Israelis have made such sacrifices for their families, for their friends and for their country, thousands of Hareidi protestors are blocking highways, attacking Supreme Court Deputy President Justice Noam Sohlberg’s private residence all in support of draft dodgers. What would Samuel say listening to a representative of the Jerusalem Faction protest say:
“We will shut down the country, and anyone who thinks they have seen it all is in for surprises. The struggle is only at its beginning, and our next steps will be far more significant.”
Irate Israelis. Israeli citizens voice their discontent with the reports of the agreement signed between the US and Iran, which completely sidelined Israel.
And what is this governments response to this anti-Zionist conduct undermining and dividing the country?
Adding insult to injury, this government under this prime minister is advancing a proposed Basic Law that elevates Torah study to a foundational national value that will define long-term Torah study as equivalent to “meaningful service” in the IDF.
Shame, Shame, Shame.
What would Samuel of 3000 years ago say today?
He would say like most are feeling.
It is time for change.
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 South African take on “As You Like It” is playing at the International Court of Justice at The Hague.
By Craig Snoyman
“Honestly m’lord, we know he was in the bank when the robbery took place, we believe he is one of the robbers. Grant us an urgent interdict preventing him from doing any further robberies. If he is the robber then we are stopping further robberies. If he is not the robber, well then, he is not suffering any harm. We’ll bring comprehensive evidence in to due course to show that he is actually the robber, we promise.”
This is not much different from the argument presented by South Africa when it arrived at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on 29 December 2023. The South African government sought renewed international relevance by filing an urgent case against Israel. And so it was that South Africa arrived, breathless with urgency, armed with the faded moral aura of Mandela with robes billowing, waving documents and followed by an army of lawyers in its wake, that might bankrupt a small country. In front of the world’s cameras, it demanded that immediate relief for what it alleged was a genocide.
The application was marked urgent.
The request for provisional measures screamed emergency.
The world was told there was no time to waste.
Hocus Pokus. Teetering on the verge of bankruptcy, the ANC announced in early January 2024 that it had suddenly managed to stabilize its finances – no explanations given – and in the same week, approached the ICJ to ask that Israel’s actions in Gaza be classified as “genocide”. Under the shadow of Iran’s plotting over proceedings, supporters of the trump-up charge outside the Western Cape High Court on 11 January 2024 in Cape Town, South Africa. (Photo: Gallo Images/Brenton Geach)
And the court played its part. The world watched two days of oral argument — a mere fortnight after filing. The provisional measures order followed against the presumptive robber, sorry, make that prospective genocider. All very urgent. All very now. All very theatrical — but then the world is a stage.
South Africa’s initial application ran to 84 pages. Its memorial, filed in October 2024, ran to over 750 pages of text with more than 4,000 pages of exhibits and annexes. Having seen the general competence of the South African government, one cannot, even on the most generous assessment, believe that it was capable of producing 4,750 pages of material between the Hamas attack of 7 October 2023 and the filing date of 29 December 2023. The unanswered question that the South African government has still not been willing to answer in public is how long, exactly, was this ‘urgent‘ application in the making before the moment of urgency that supposedly required it? The leader of the South African legal team, John Dugard– the man who has spent at least the last 10 years agitating against Israel – probably knows the answer. The circumstantial evidence suggests that it was not a mere three months in creation.
“Urgency” allowed South Africa to leapfrog the queue and obtain interim relief before a final hearing. The premise of urgency was that the harm was occurring now, that it could not wait for the judicial mill to grind at its exceedingly slow pace. Any delay would cause irreparable damage to rights that deserve protection. Whether the other party is left carrying the stigma as a robber, or a genocider, is outweighed by the risk of potential harm.
On 26 January 2024, the International Court of Justice issued its Order on provisional measures. The court explicitly stated that its order was “not a ruling on whether Israel is in breach of the Genocide Convention.” The former President of the ICJ, Joan Donoghue — who had presided over the very hearings in question — explained that the court had not found that it was plausible that Israel was committing genocide. It had found that certain rights asserted by South Africa — not the right to be free from genocide as such, but rights under the Genocide Convention — were plausible enough to justify provisional protection from irreparable harm pending a full hearing.
Corrupting the Court. Despite former ICJ President Joan E. Donoghue clarifying to the BBC that the court did NOT conclude that there was a “plausible case” of genocide against Israel in Gaza, did not stop the global hysteria from propagating otherwise in order to besmirch the character of the State of Israel.
This finding detonated through global media like a diplomatic hand grenade. South Africa celebrated and its domestic commentators declared that the ICJ had found that Israel was ‘plausibly committing genocide.’ Legal academics issued breathless analyses confirming that the court believed genocide was occurring. I recall one very prominent South African law professor asking Natasha Hausdorff where she got her law degree, after Hausdorff had pointed out to her that the court had not found there was a plausible genocide.
The distinction is not technical wordplay. It is the difference between a court saying “we find it plausible that the party is a robber” and a court saying “we find it plausible that there are rights worth protecting while we decide whether the party is a robber.” The court followed the latter principle. South Africa’s government either did not read that part, or found it inconvenient. The world’s media, supplied with South Africa’s narrative and disinclined to examine ICJ jurisprudence on a Friday afternoon, ran with the finding that a genocide was plausible.
South Africa filed its memorial in October 2024: 750 pages of text, 4,000 pages of exhibits. Israel could and did raise preliminary objections to jurisdiction and admissibility, choosing not to raise the issues as a standalone exercise earlier, which would delay proceedings for six to twelve months while they are decided. Israel has raised these arguments in its counter-memorial, filed on 12 March 2026, requesting extensions from the court. South Africa opposed these extensions on the grounds that they “undermined the urgency of the proceedings.”
THE ‘PLOT’S’ (ANTI)CLIMAX
On 21 May 2026, a notice was published on the ICJ website which granted South Africa until 22 November 2027 to file its replying memorial, and set 22 May 2029 as the deadline for Israel’s rejoinder. The same country that stated extensions undermine the urgency of the proceedings asked for and was granted an extension of 18 months. If previous court procedure is followed then Oral Hearings, should probably occur in late 2029. A final judgment as to whether genocide actually occurred would only be expected sometime in 2030 or 2031.
If the matter was urgent enough to demand provisional measures within two weeks of filing, it is curious that when faced with Israel’s 1,000-page counter-memorial and its 4,000 pages of exhibits, South Africa now requires 18 months to formulate a reply. Perhaps South Africa’s founding memorial represented the entirety of the government’s awareness, and the subsequent 4,750-page memorial required far more critical analysis on a matter which is far more complex than it had initially led the world to believe. One wonders whether Pretoria’s legal team had war-gamed the scenario where the funding pipeline has dried up when further rounds of written pleadings and oral hearings still need to be attended to. Perhaps that accounts for the 18-month extension request. Perhaps the delay is not about complexity. Perhaps it is about waiting to see whether the financial climate improves, whether the government in Tehran survives and proves generous, or whether some other source of support emerges to defray the huge costs of this case.
Murky Machinations. Responding to allegations that the ANC received funding from Iran to finance the legal costs to charging Israel at the ICJ in the Hague of “genocide”, the Iranian Ambassador to South Africa, Mansour Shakib Mehr, refuted such allegations at a press conference saying that in any event, “the case was filed by the South African government” and “not filed by the ANC.” (Photo: Supplied)
Israel has carried the ‘genocide state’ label since 7 October 2023 — the date Hamas committed the largest massacre of Jews since the Second World War. This label was magnified by the January 2024 order, mischaracterised by governments, adopted by protest movements, and has been continuously repeated by worldwide legacy and social media for the last two and a half years.
No finding of genocide has been made.
The ICJ has not concluded that genocide occurred or is occurring. The court has issued provisional measures — temporary interdicts pending a full hearing — but has explicitly declined to rule on the merits. But Israel will continue to carry the ‘genocide state’ label until the finalisation of the case.
What will happen if, sometime around 2030, the ICJ finds for Israel on the preliminary objections alone, by holding that the court lacks jurisdiction, or that the application is inadmissible or that the genocide convention cannot be expanded into a general mechanism for adjudicating the legality of the use of force? Or my personal favourite: that no dispute exists because no “positively opposed views” had been found and there had been no exchanges, either publicly or privately, to establish a dispute. This would be a monumental screw-up on the part of South Africa, and Dugard did not address the issue particularly well in January 2024. The case would be dismissed without any finding on the merits. In the court of public opinion, Israel would not be found innocent of genocide, because the court would have examined whether genocide occurred. It would simply have been determined that South Africa had no standing, or that the court had no jurisdiction, or that the application was procedurally defective.
“WORDS, WORDS, WORDS”
The genocide label, however, will remain in circulation. The articles will not be retracted. The resolutions will not be rescinded. The protest chants will not be updated. Public opinion operates on narratives, and the narrative of a “genocide state,” “ICJ genocide case” “plausibly genocidal” will be further grist to the mill.
Israel would emerge from nine years of lawfare and worldwide accusations of genocide in the world’s highest court, having its reputation treated as collateral damage by a government in Pretoria that has neither the answers to confront it legally or to comply within the timeframes it originally demanded to prevent undermining the process.
Rot in the Republic. While the republic of South Africa’s government focuses on pursuing false charges of genocide against Israel, it fails abysmally in dealing with humanity issues at home like these foreign nationals sleeping on the street after fleeing their homes amid anti-immigrant protests in Durban, South Africa on June 9, 2026. While demonstrations across the country have escalated into violence, resulting in injuries and the deaths of foreign nationals, South Africa’s government prefers to focus on Gaza! (Photo: Reuters/Rogan Ward)
And what if Israel is successful on the merits? There is apparently an amicus curia brief (a report to aid the court by a non-party) by some of the world’s pre-eminent military experts, stating that Israel’s war in Gaza has been more protective of non-combatants in a warzone than any other war in the history of mankind. It makes no difference. For the duration of this case — which will extend into the 2030s, Israel has carried and will continue to carry a status in international community that one might describe as the legal equivalent of a skunk at a garden party. No formal finding of genocide. No conviction. A verdict of acquittal. But the association, repeated daily in global media, in university campuses, in governmental statements from hostile states have real-world effects on trade, on diplomatic relations, on the treatment of both Israeli nationals and Jews abroad.
South Africa will continue to play the role of the global avenger until a final verdict is delivered and possibly even beyond. And while it reads its lines and while its government officials talk of accountability and international law, they speak with the sincerity of men who have spent the better part of the last few years avoiding both.
About the writer:
Craig Snoymanis a practising advocate in South Africa.
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).
South Africa exposes through ineptitude its true motivations behind its fabricated case against Israel.
By Kenneth Moeng Kgwadi
Nearly two months after Hamas launched its deadly surprise attack on the State of Israel, the ANC-led government brought a case against Israel before the United Nations’ International Court of Justice (ICJ), accusing it of violating the 1948 Genocide Convention. South Africa alleged that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) were committing acts of genocide in Gaza.
The move was not entirely surprising, given that the ANC had refrained from unequivocally condemning the initial Hamas attack, during which approximately 1,195 people were killed, more than 5,400 were injured, and 251 others were abducted and taken into the dark and dangerous tunnel network beneath the Gaza Strip.
What a Drag! South Africa’s “genocide” case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) is set to drag on for at least another three years after Pretoria requested an 18-month extension to file its response to Israel’s defence.
There have been allegations that Iran influenced and financially supported the ANC in pursuing legal action against Israel. While these claims remain contested, they have fueled debate about the motivations behind South Africa’s decision to bring the case before the International Court of Justice.
It is also noteworthy that none of the 22 Arab states spanning the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region took the lead in initiating similar legal proceedings against Israel. This raises legitimate questions about why South Africa, located thousands of kilometres from the conflict zone, assumed such a prominent role.
To make matters worse, Egypt, which shares a border with Gaza through the Rafah Border Crossing, maintained strict controls on the movement of Palestinians into its territory during much of the conflict. Given the geographic proximity and direct regional implications of the war, it would have seemed more logical for one or more neighbouring states to spearhead the legal challenge against Israel rather than a country situated at the southern tip of Africa.
The South African government’s recent request for an 18-month extension to submit its written response, or Memorial as it is formally known, demonstrates that there was no real sense of urgency from the outset, despite claims to the contrary when it initiated its legal campaign against Israel at the end of 2023. Common sense suggests that, had the matter truly been urgent, South Africa would have acted with greater speed and efficiency in assisting the ICJ by providing the necessary legal material and evidence required for the Court to make a determination.
Pitfalls of the Plotters. What began with pretentious haste by South Africa’s legal team has now slowed to a snail pace through ineptitude. Seen here in early days of the proceedings at the ICJ are Vusimuzi Madonsela, the South African ambassador to the Netherlands (right), with South Africa’s justice minister, Ronald Lamola. (Photo: Hollandse Hoogte/Rex/Shutterstock)
It is quite evident that the ANC-led government was misled by Iran and Hamas, who knew that the allegations levelled against Israel were fabricated and lacked any factual basis.
It is hypocritical for the ANC-led government to initiate a legal case and then become the very party requesting a delay in its own proceedings. There appears to be little logic in such a course of action. What, then:
– becomes of the claims that genocide was taking place in Gaza?
– Was this legal action not intended to halt what the government described as an ongoing genocide?
If the government already possessed the facts and evidence that prompted it to approach the ICJ, why would it require almost two years merely to submit a written Memorial? Such a delay would perhaps be more understandable if it had been requested by Israel, the respondent in the case, rather than by South Africa, the applicant.
So far, we have learned that this ICJ case has already cost taxpayers a staggering R130 million, and it is likely to require even more funding beyond 2029 should the government of the day choose to continue pursuing it. The prolonged delay risks rendering the case increasingly irrelevant, as geopolitical realities are constantly evolving and may ultimately diminish its significance in the years ahead. Israel is expected to hold elections before the end of this year, while South Africa is preparing for its own national elections in 2029. These political developments could significantly influence the nature of relations, or tensions, between the two countries.
‘BURDEN’ OF PROOF
What is clear is that the ICJ case carries not only a substantial financial burden but also far-reaching economic and diplomatic consequences, some of which South Africa has already begun to experience. Several individuals have effectively been shown the door after the United States declined to approve South Africa’s nominee for ambassador to Washington, D.C. Relations between Pretoria and Washington continue to deteriorate, with tensions further exacerbated by the United States’ Afrikaner refugee programme. At the same time, escalating tariffs threaten to affect ordinary South Africans who are already grappling with economic hardship.
Unwelcome in the USA. Not mincing his words in offending the US president, the newly appointed South African Ambassador to the U.S. Ebrahim Rasool was declared persona non grata and expelled in mid-March 2025.
South Africa would be better served by adhering to a policy of non-alignment, refraining from direct involvement in foreign conflicts while continuing to advocate for peace and dialogue, principles it has sought to champion since 1994. Becoming entangled in distant geopolitical disputes risks imposing severe economic costs on citizens who are already struggling to make ends meet. Major BRICS members such as China and India have generally avoided unnecessarily escalating tensions with the United States, recognising the significant economic and diplomatic consequences that can arise from such confrontations.
About the writer:
Kenneth Moeng Kgwadi is a political scientist, columnist and research fellow at the Middle East Africa Research Institute (MEARI).
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).
