American hostages in Gaza, alive and dead, are awaiting their rescuers - where are they? - Op-ed
The incoming US Administration and Israel, and mutual allies, have but a moment to change history - for the better.
There are—as far as we know—four living American-Israeli citizens still languishing somewhere in Hamas terror dungeons in Gaza, along with the known remains of another three.
More than 390 days after they were brutally kidnapped by Iranian-backed, trained, and funded rampaging mobs of monsters, they are—along with their mostly Israeli cohorts—among the 101 in total, still cruelly held by their captors, without a single sign of life or International Red Cross visit.
Opposing every single attempted negotiated “deal” offered so far by Israel, Egypt, the US, and other interlocutors, Hamas and Iran, and other terror groups and associated gangs, are exclusively responsible for their continued captivity.
Not Bibi, not Biden; the only terms the terrorists demand are ones that, ultimately, give them victory.
Meanwhile, as the clock is running out:
In recent days the IDF shot an incoming explosive drone “from the east” out of the sky near the iconic Masada fortress—an iconic site of Jewish resistance since the Roman siege in 73AD.
As I wrote in an earlier post, while it's as yet unclear if the incoming aerial munition was launched from Iranian territory or one of their Syrian, Iraqi, or Houthi proxies, just an FYI to our murderous foes so sworn to our destruction: when we said, “שנית מצדה לא תיפול” - "Masada Shall Not Fall Again," we weren't kidding
Israel is fighting an existential seven-front war that it didn’t initiate, and cannot afford to lose.
Meanwhile, “Iran threatens Israel with nuclear attack. Sign in central Tehran apparently says ‘Teleshima’ (Tel Aviv - Hiroshima)” [via Fern Musings]. 2nd sign, in Hebrew and Arabic: “America will discard you like used toilet paper.”
Mister President-Elect Trump, and Prime Minister Netanyahu: it’s long past time to go after the head of the snake in Tehran; the leaders who are demonically holding the Gaza hostages and their families in torture and terror, the Iranian people in a half-century of grief, Middle East shipping and commerce at their Houthi proxy’s whim, and the fate of the West—all of us, indeed—hostage to their death wish to assemble and use a nuclear weapon against Israel—first. But not only.
But while we—God forbid—are first in their bomb sights, we’re just the “Little Satan” to them. The United States of America is the “Big Satan” and, in our local version of Trump’s campaign slogan: it’s you, America, that they’re really after; we—here in Israel—are just in the way.
The Mullahs are gloating over holding all of us hostage to their regional mayhem. Isn’t it time for a surge of diplomatic and political courage, military planning, and tenacity, to turn over heaven and earth to free the Gaza hostages by force, and end their and their families’ torture?
And free Israel, and the West, from the looming threat of collective annihilation at the hands of a regime of merciless Islamic supremacists.
This report will be updated as events dictate. Meanwhile, please feel free to share this post, subscribe, and help support my efforts to bring you accurate, sourced reporting, and close-up-and-personal slice-of-life scenes here in northern Israel and our Life on the Border - thank you for your consideration:
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David Bender