Israel Spares No Expense to Rescue Kidnapped Nationals

Day Four–and the three kidnapped Israeli boys are still missing.

Everything is happening all at once:

The IDF has launched a massive manhunt on the West Bank. They have also asked journalists to use the hashtag #EyalGiladNaftali and to include photos of the boys and videos of the ongoing search. In order to prevent the kidnappers from fleeing the area with their prey, Israel has closed the Erez and Keren Shalom crossings. IDF updates may be found here.

Ari Soffer, of Israel National News, has also mounted a site devoted to updating the situation. 

The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) strongly believe that Hamas–and Hamas alone–is behind this kidnapping. Hamas is an organization similar to Boko Haram, Hezbollah, Al-Qaeda, and ISIS, and it is now Mahmud Abbas’s coalition partner in an attempt to unite Palestinians. These organizations wish to create a global Islamic Caliphate under Shariah law. Although Sunni Muslims are locked in a perpetual religious war against Shiia Muslims, both groups envision a similar triumph of anti-infidel barbarism and gender and religious apartheid.

IDF Chief of Staff General Benny Gantz states: “We’re going to hit Hamas hard and continue forward.” He is clearly a man of his word. To date, forty senior Hamas officials have been arrested and 150 have so far been detained.

Yesterday, a gun battle took place in Hebron, and two major Hamas officials were arrested. According to one source, Hassan Yusuf, one of the top Hamas officials arrested on Sunday, gave a speech a week ago at Bir Zeit University (a university that is funded by the American government) which warned that Hamas would bring an uprising to the West Bank. He stated that his organization would continue on the path of terrorism despite the accord with the PA. He said, “Every centimeter of the soil of historic Palestine is part of the Resistance that emanates from the Gaza Strip.”

Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon is considering the re-establishment of a campaign of targeted killings against Hamas to thwart future attacks. He believes that Hamas should pay a “heavy price” for their continued aggression.

According to Israel National News, “The executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) convened for a meeting on Sunday, following which it accused Israel of terrorism and rejected Israel’s placing the blame on the Palestinian Authority for the kidnapping of the three yeshiva students in Gush Etzion.”

Martians did it. Maybe the Zionists did it themselves–the same Zionists who were behind the 9/11 plot.

The committee, headed by PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, condemned Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu for what it termed his “racist attack” on the PA and its leader using the kidnapping of “three settlers” as an excuse.

I interviewed two of Israel’s leading anti-terrorism experts. According to Dr. Mordechai Kedar, former IDF military intelligence officer and currently one of Israel’s leading Arabists, “Hamas wants to follow the Hizballah model: to sit in a government and to continue terror. Israel has decided to put an end to it in the beginning by cracking the Hamas infrastructure, in order to prevent another Hamastan in Judea and Samaria (aka West Bank).”

Anat Berko, criminologist, IDF lieutenant colonel, and anti-terrorism researcher, tells me: “Every Jew on earth is a target. Hamas is part of the Global Jihad that endangers the world’s safety. They are connected to the ideology of the Islamists fighting in Iraq and Syria. They all share the same Ideology of Radical Islam. Every day we get a wakeup call in the West and yet there are still people who don’t understand what one Hamas leader told me ‘We will start with Shabbat and finish on Sunday.'”

To repeat: Hamas is a terrorist organization similar in ideology to Boko Haram. Nevertheless, First Lady Michelle Obama has not yet tweeted, “Bring our boys home,” as she did when the Nigerian Christian girls were captured by Boko Haram.

Well, no matter. While the Israeli boys may still be missing–so are the Christian Nigerian girls.

Here’s the difference: Israel will not rest until the boys are found. They will spare no expense, either in blood or treasure, to bring them back. Nigeria’s President, Goodluck Jonathan, will do no such thing.

Is Israel so hated because it cherishes life and does not worship death? Because it will not sacrifice its children to martyrdom operations? Because it does not hide behind children when engaged in battle? Or locate their weapons in kindergartens and hospitals? Is Israel demonized because Israel protects its children and does not believe in child sacrifice? (This is precisely what God meant when he told Abraham’s not to sacrifice his son Issac). Is this reason enough to incur undying enmity? Palestinians celebrate the martyrdom of their children and young men and women as well as the barbaric murder of others. They are praising this kidnapping.

Nevertheless, miracles abound. Robert Mardini, the head of the International Red Cross in the Middle East, has called for the boys’ immediate and unconditional release and has offered to be an intermediary. Secretary of State John Kerry has also condemned the kidnapping. Mahmud Abbas himself has also condemned this act–but it took him four days to do so.

Last night, more than 30,000 Jews prayed for the safe return of the three boys at the Kotel. On their way back, Arabs gratuitously attacked them with rocks and bats and blood-curdling curses.

Eighty-five Palestinian terrorist prisoners in jail in Israel have been on a hunger strike for the last seven weeks. According to Avi Issacharoff, at the Times of Israel, three top Hamas officials, Hassan Salameh, Abbas-al Sayd, and Mahmud Shreitach, have just ended their fast.

At first, the usual terror apologists blamed Israel for provoking this latest outrage and trotted out the usual Big Lies (“Israel tortures children,’ etc.). According to Honest Reporting, the American media initially described the boys as “settlers” not as teenage Yeshiva students; the media also reminded their readers that the Palestinians are merely (!) seeking “justice” against the “oppression of occupation via settlement”. Read the British Guardian and the Christian Science Monitor. While the Washington Post and the New York Times carried stories, they have done little follow-up and have not featured this story on their front pages. By the way: the Washington Post article was accompanied by a photograph of Israelis arresting a Palestinian man. Today, the New York Times has a story on page A4 which is continued on page A8–edging closer to their front page.

While there is filthy anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism (the two are the same right now) stinking up the internet, I also think that the demonization of Israel is slightly less vicious this time around. I believe that the horrifying events spiraling out of control in Syria and Iraq have perhaps put Hamas, at least temporarily, in a new light. Yesterday, even CNN had a fairly balanced story on the kidnapping, including an interview with the Frankel parents.

The great Talmudic scholar, Adin-Even Steinsaltz, the head of the yeshiva where two of the three kidnapped boys are studying, has called upon Jews to pray and to study Torah. The Israeli Consulate in New York City will be hosting a Prayer Vigil at 12:30pm today.

Today, Deputy Minister Ofir Akunis has called on the international community to withdraw its support for the Hamas-Fatah unity government. He says: “It is the ultimate moral duty of the nations of the world to withdraw their recognition of the Palestinian terrorist government.”

President Obama: Are you listening? Will you go to Jerusalem, the West Bank, Ashkelon, and Gaza to see, first hand, what living next door to a terrorist state whose sole aim is your destruction is like? Will you?