Category: Ceasefire

Hamas Violated Ceasefire Within 15 Minutes

MATT MARGOLIS | 9:30 AM ON NOVEMBER 24, 2023
SEE: https://pjmedia.com/matt-margolis/2023/11/24/hamas-violated-ceasefire-within-15-minutes-n4924194;Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.

AP Photo/Abed Khaled
A temporary ceasefire, or pause, between Israel and Hamas, was set to begin Friday morning. The pause was offered in exchange for at least 50 women and children hostages in Gaza, while Israel also agreed to pause hostilities for at least four days and release 150 Palestinian women and children in Israeli custody.

According to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), Palestinian militants in Gaza violated the established ceasefire agreement within 15 minutes. The IDF reported they intercepted a rocket aimed at southern Israel.

Related: Yes, Biden Is Trying To Dictate How Israel Runs Its War With Hamas

"Rocket sirens sounded in the evacuated southern Israeli towns of Kissufim and Ein HaShlosha early on Friday morning, shortly after a four-day ceasefire came into effect that will allow a prisoner exchange and the delivery of humanitarian aid into the besieged and devastated Gaza Strip,” reported Newsweek.

"There was a rocket and it was intercepted," the IDF Spokesperson's Unit told Newsweek of the reports, noting it was fired at 7:15 a.m. local time; 15 minutes after the ceasefire—which the IDF is calling an "operational pause"—came into effect.

It is not yet clear which group was responsible for the alleged rocket launch, though the IDF has previously said Hamas bears responsibility for any attacks from Gaza into southern Israel given it holds influence over other local militant groups.

Newsweek has contacted a Hamas spokesperson by WhatsApp to request comment.

Friday's pause in the fighting comes after several weeks of tough negotiations between Israel, Hamas, the U.S., Egypt, and Qatar. It is the first significant break in combat since the Hamas infiltration attack into southern Israel on October 7, which killed some 1,200 people and saw around 240 taken back into the Gaza Strip as hostages. 

This is not the first time Hamas previously postponed the ceasefire until Friday, which IDF spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Conricus says is  “indicative” of their “psychological warfare” tactics.

“Our posture on the ground will be to continue operations until specifically told by the government to change and facilitate the repatriation of Israeli hostages,” Conricus said Thursday. “This delay, I think, is indicative of what Hamas has been doing all along and will probably do throughout the implementation of this agreement. They are playing a game of psychological warfare where they want to extract maximum pain and discomfort and terror with Israeli civilians waiting for their loved ones to come home.”

Related: Hamas Is Playing Games With Hostage Release Agreement

Last month, Hamas also agreed to release two hostages in what was likely an attempt to delay a ground invasion as opposed to a gesture of good faith.

It is highly questionable whether Hamas actually intends to release any more hostages at all. But, clearly, Hamas can’t be trusted. There’s already chatter on social media blaming Israel for continued hostilities despite the ceasefire agreement. Clearly, Hamas knows that it can successfully manipulate the media to push the narrative they want.

BREAKING: Hamas releases 25 hostages amid Israeli cease-fire deal

Hamas releases 25 hostages: 13 Israelis and 12 Thai nationals. Hamas has agreed to release the first 13 hostages it took during the October 7 attack on Israel. Israel will in turn release Palestinian prisoners it has been holding. This is the first of several exchanges set to happen during a 4-day cease-fire. Hamas kidnapped more than 200 men, women, and children during the initial attack.

A Ceasefire Deal With Hamas Would Be a Mistake

  BY 

SEE: https://www.jihadwatch.org/2023/11/a-ceasefire-deal-with-hamas-would-be-a-mistake;

Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.

The only way to win is to pin Hamas in place and destroy it.

Terrorists and insurgents have one defensive strategy. When faced with superior force and numbers, they pull back, melt into the civilian population, and wait for a nation-state to exhaust itself and tire of hunting them.

Taking out a terrorist group requires moving fast, being agile, gaining the element of surprise, and choking off exits for the terrorists.

After a fairly slow start, Israel showed it had a good handle on speed and agility in ground attacks. It bypassed Hamas kill zones and took key Hamas infrastructure. But the problem is that Hamas is not a conventional military and seizing territory and infrastructure counts for only so much unless it’s used to choke off the movement of terrorists.

And then finish them.

Qatar, a state sponsor of Hamas, has been pushing for a ‘ceasefire’ deal in which some (not all) hostages will be traded for an extended ceasefire of a number of days. Hamas supporters around the world have been frenziedly chanting “ceasefire”.

The goal is the same.

Why does Hamas want a ceasefire? It needs time and space to escape the trap that Israel spent time and blood constructing.

Giving it to them would be a strategic disaster.

The lesson of Al-Shifa Hospital is that trying to conduct a humanitarian assault doesn’t work. Certainly, if Israel hopes to militarily free hostages, it can’t slowly edge its way toward its goal while offering every possible humanitarian concession. Israel has to strike quickly and unexpectedly. A difficult thing to do in urban ground warfare already.

Hamas bet that it could wait out Israel’s response. It did so in the past. Why not again?

The Biden administration would like a hostage deal and it’s not shy about dealing with terrorists. Qatar is exploiting that. And Israel’s government has internal divisions. Benny Gantz has emphasized that the war will go on until “our sons and daughters come home.” That’s a hostage release scenario. Not Netanyahu’s goal of destroying Hamas.

And we’ve already seen from Al-Shifa hospital that Hamas will kill hostages if it can’t use them as leverage.

The only way to justify this operation is to pin Hamas in place and destroy it. The failure to do that will drag this out until international pressure forces an end to it. Hamas forces will slip away, regroup, and relaunch their operations.

And that would amount to at best a stalemate if not a very expensive Hamas victory.

DNC HQ Evacuated As Police Clash With Protestors Demanding Cease-Fire

Jewish Peace Activists Rally Near Capitol Hill WASHINGTON, DC - NOVEMBER 15: Members of U.S. Capitol Police take a protester away from the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee during a demonstration against the war between Israel and Hamas on November 15, 2023 on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. Jewish Voice for Peace and If Not Now held a candlelight vigil to call for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Members of U.S. Capitol Police take a protester away from the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee during a demonstration against the war between Israel and Hamas on November 15, 2023, on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. Jewish Voice for Peace and If Not Now held a candlelight vigil to call for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

OAN’s Abril Elfi 
2:50 PM – Thursday, November 16, 2023

SEE: https://www.oann.com/newsroom/dnc-hq-evacuated-as-police-clash-with-protestors-demanding-cease-fire/;

Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.

Authorities have clashed with protestors demanding a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas-Gaza conflict outside the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee (DNC).

On Wednesday, law enforcement arrested hundreds of protesters demanding a cease-fire in the Hamas-Israel war outside the DNC Washington headquarters.

According to authorities, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), House Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) and Representative Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.) were among those inside the headquarters as the clash between protesters and police sparked.

United States Capitol Police said on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, that a “large group of illegal protesters…have cleared out, but USCP officers will stay on scene out of an abundance of caution.” 

They previously put the number of demonstrators at about 150 and said they were “violently protesting in the area.”

Six officers were treated for injuries as a result of the demonstration, and one person was arrested and accused of assault on an officer, Capitol Police said on X.

According to Capitol Police, all lawmakers were evacuated from the location for their protection.

IfNotNow, an organization that bills itself as “American Jews organizing our community to end U.S. support for Israel’s apartheid system,” stated it was present at the rally and accused officers of being harsh toward protestors.

IfNotNow spokesperson Eva Borgwardt released a statement saying the protest was “nonviolent” and a “moral act of civil disobedience to call on Democrats to support a cease-fire and an end to our government’s funding of violence against Palestinian civilians by Netanyahu’s far-right government.”

Representative Sean Casten (D-Ill.), posted on X that he was “rescued” from the DNC building by “armed officers” who “did not know the protestors’ intent; they knew only that Members of Congress were inside, could not leave and that protests would not let police through.”

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Chaos at DNC HQ When Pro-Palestinian Rioters Attempt to Break In

659f2b46-bffb-43ac-acfd-4f5c7c5a120b-1052x615.jpg

Chaos erupted outside the Democratic National Committee headquarters Wednesday evening when pro-Palestinian protesters became violent as they called for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war.

U.S. Capitol Police (USCP) estimated that approximately 150 people were "illegally and violently protesting" near the DNC headquarters on Capitol Hill. 

Six officers were injured during the melee, according to the USCP, with either minor cuts, pepper-spray burns, or being attacked by rioters.

CNN reports that House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, House Minority Whip Katherine Clark, and Rep. Pete Aguilar were inside the building at the time of the riot, and had to be evacuated.

Around 150 officers and a minimum of 50 police cruisers from The Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) were also on the scene. Videos of the chaos were shared on social media.

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) reported that the situation was so bad that the Capitol went into lockdown.

The violent mob of pro-Palestinian rioters stands in contrast to the peaceful March for Israel that took place on the National Mall a day prior. 

Ask yourself why.

Biden Regime Pushes for a Three-Day ‘Pause’ Proposed by Hamas

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SEE: https://www.jihadwatch.org/2023/11/biden-regime-pushes-for-a-3-day-pause-proposed-by-hamas;

Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.

The Biden administration is playing into the hands of Islamic terrorists.

Israel has pushed deep into Gaza. It has mobilized large numbers of troops is taking out top Hamas leaders and is on the verge of a full push into Gaza City that would finish Hamas.

And the Biden administration is pushing a demand straight from a demand by Hamas and its state sponsor, the Islamic terrorist state of Qatar.

President Joe Biden confirmed on Tuesday that he asked Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for a pause in the fighting in Gaza.

“I asked Prime Minister Netanyahu for a pause in the fighting in Gaza in a call on Monday,” Biden said, as quoted by Reuters.

Biden’s comments came hours after Barak Ravid of Axios reported that Biden urged Netanyahu in their call on Monday to agree to a three-day pause in the fighting to allow progress in releasing some of the hostages held by Hamas in Gaza.

According to a proposal that is being discussed between the US, Israel and Qatar, Hamas would release 10-15 hostages and use the three-day pause to verify the identities of all the hostages and deliver a list of names of the people it is holding, a US official told Ravid.

Remember when Hamas was claiming that it would release all the hostages in exchange for a 24-hour pause?

Hamas doesn’t need a three-day pause to verify the identities of the hostages. It’s had them for a month now.

Netanyahu has offered a pause in exchange for the release of all the hostages. Hamas won’t do that. And any list it produces is likely to be worthless. Islamic terrorists have a history of trying to claim ransom for dead bodies. It’s unknown how many of the hostages are actually alive. But if Hamas wants to verify all that, it can let the Red Cross (the actual one, not the Red Crescent which is just Hamas in a different color uniform) get access to them.

If there’s any lesson to be learned from Oct 7, it’s that Islamic terrorists lie. They attack under ceasefires, make false promises, and do anything they can to kill their victims.

The Israeli official told Axios that part of Netanyahu’s reservation is because Hamas attacked a group of Israeli soldiers, kidnapped one of them, and killed several others during a humanitarian pause during the 2014 Operation Protective Edge.

The Biden administration tried to rebrand the “humanitarian pause” as a “tactical pause”. Big mistake. This is a ground operation. Unlike air strikes, you’ve got soldiers in the middle of a battlefield. You can’t just hit the pause button. It’s one thing to have the WWI Christmas snowball fight, but we’re dealing here with monsters who cannot be trusted.

Why does Hamas keep demanding a pause and why do its supporters rally for a ceasefire?

Hamas has been hit hard, it needs to reposition, get some of its leaders out, move resources around, and launch new attacks. Israel’s approach has been to keep hammering it, to move quickly, be agile, and force it to react.

The Islamic terror group would like to stop reacting and take some kind of initiative.

That is what the ‘pause’ or the ‘ceasefire’ is for. It would be disastrous to agree to it.

The spectacular deal presented by Hamas and the Al-Thanis of Qatar is that it might release as many as 15 hostages in exchange for Israel allowing it to take the tactical initiative. Instead of Israel ending it and freeing the surviving hostages.

There’s nothing surprising about the actions of Hamas and Qatar here, but the Biden administration is playing into the hands of Islamic terrorists by pushing this offer.

Islamic Republic of Iran says US will ‘be hit hard’ if there is no ceasefire in Gaza

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SEE: https://www.jihadwatch.org/2023/11/islamic-republic-of-iran-says-us-will-be-hit-hard-if-there-is-no-ceasefire-in-gaza;

Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.

Funny how Rashida Tlaib and Nihad Awad are advocating the same course of action as Mohammad-Reza Ashtiani, Iran’s Minister of Defence.

“Iran’s chilling threat to America over Israel: Islamic regime says the US will be ‘hit hard’ if no Gaza ceasefire is implemented – after Tehran-backed Hezbollah terrorists warned of escalation on Lebanon border,” by Nick Craven and Summer Goodkind, Daily Mail, November 5, 2023:

Iran has issued a chilling threat to the United States, telling them it will ‘be hit hard’ if no ceasefire is implemented in Gaza, amid new fears that Israel’s war on Hamas in Gaza could escalate.

Mohammad-Reza Ashtiani, Iran’s Minister of Defence, emphasized the urgency, stating: ‘Our advice to the Americans is to immediately halt the war in Gaza and implement a ceasefire, otherwise they will be hit hard.’

But Mr Blinken rejected a ceasefire, insisting it would only give Iranian-backed Hamas a chance to regroup following its horrific attack on Israel on October 7, killing 1,400 civilians and taking more than 240 hostage.

Instead, Mr Blinken pressed for ‘pauses’ in the fighting to allow civilians to evacuate from the battleground of Gaza City and the northern part of the enclave, which is being pounded with heavy Israeli artillery barrages as the war passes its 30th day.

The uncompromising tone was echoed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who pledged at an air force base: ‘There will be no ceasefire without the return of our hostages, we say this to both our enemies and our friends. We will continue until we beat them.’

Another senior Iranian government figure ramped up the tension with the West still further.

Mohammad Reza Naqdi deputy leader of the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, said: ‘If Israel’s crimes continue, we should strike America’s interests,’ without specifying how….

Biden Regime Warns Israel Has Limited Time Before It Pulls Support

  BY 

SEE: https://www.jihadwatch.org/2023/11/biden-regime-warns-israel-has-limited-time-before-it-pulls-support;

Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.

“It is a matter of weeks before the White House is compelled to call for a ceasefire.”

Publicly, the Biden administration is pressuring Israel for pauses in the fighting. Privately it’s also warning that support is on the way out.

According to CNN, top Biden administration officials have been increasingly warning Israel that it will become more and more challenging to pursue Jerusalem’s goal of toppling Hamas in Gaza due to the international outcry and that there is limited time to do so with full US support.

The outlet quotes unnamed sources saying close Biden advisers believe that it is a matter of weeks before the White House is compelled to call for a ceasefire.

“If this really goes bad, we want to be able to point to our past statements,” the outlet quotes one official as saying, adding that the Biden administration doesn’t want there to be a perception that it supports all of Jerusalem’s actions and that US arms were used to kill civilians.

It says that “particularly jarring to Biden and his national security team” were strikes on Jabaliya that accompanied an IDF takeover of a Hamas command center situated there, which reportedly caused many civilian deaths. Biden “didn’t like this at all,” one source is quoted as saying.

What Biden doesn’t like is that the poll numbers are bad in his party. There are threats from Islamic groups that they’ll sit out the election and make Biden lose. There are other threats from leftists that they’ll primary him.

I’m surprised Biden, and for that matter Pelosi and Hillary, have made arguments against a ceasefire, but they’ll end up backing one as the war goes on.

Netanyahu decided to at least break in word from Secretary of State Blinken on a call for more supplies into Gaza. The argument from the Biden administration is that aid and ‘humanitarian pauses’ will help improve world opinion, prevent the U.S. from being isolated, and allow it to support Israel, but there’s zero chance of that happening. The Muslim world will go its predictable way, Russia and China already have, smelling a chance to undermine America, and the various Third World nations are doing their usual thing. That means Israel can’t afford any pauses. It’s a bait and switch that won’t work anyway and the Biden administration will pull its support when the political clock runs out.

We’re getting the usual anonymous tribal balloons ahead of time. Jewish Dems will be told the usual story that the Biden administration did the right thing and blame Netanyahu and the “ultra right-wing government” for losing the support of the administration and the world. Maybe now coming to the end of his political career, after having tried to play that game, jumping through hoops, making good arguments, he’s learned the futility of playing the rigged game.

Do the right thing, not the politically correct thing.

Tlaib and CAIR’s Awad Threaten Biden Where It Hurts: No Votes for You Without Ceasefire

ROBERT SPENCER | 9:34 AM ON NOVEMBER 05, 2023
SEE: https://pjmedia.com/robert-spencer/2023/11/05/tlaib-and-cairs-awad-threaten-biden-where-it-hurts-no-votes-for-you-without-ceasefire-n4923638;Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.

Gerald Herbert
The longstanding leftist/Islamic alliance has never seen this much strain. Will it be enough to bring down the Biden regime and Democrat Party hegemony? It’s possible.

As enraged pro-Hamas demonstrators tried on Saturday to break down the gate surrounding the White House and storm the grounds, high-profile Muslim leaders warned Old Joe and his henchmen that they couldn’t count on the support of haters of Israel unless the Biden regime forced the Jewish state to accept a ceasefire. A ceasefire may seem like a reasonable request at first glance, which is why the pro-Hamas forces are couching their demands in this language, but if Israel stopped fighting short of its goal to destroy Hamas utterly, it would essentially amount to a surrender to Hamas and other jihad groups. They would live again to massacre more Israeli civilians another day.

And so Ibrahim Hooper of the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a longtime master at manipulating public opinion, professed at the Washington demonstration to be motivated solely by humanitarian concerns: "The main goal of everyone right now is a cease-fire," the old dissembler said, adding: "You can't do anything without a cease-fire − you can't do humanitarian aid, you can't treat the wounded, you can't even remove bodies until there's a cease-fire. Nothing should get in the way of a humanitarian cease-fire." Nothing! Not even Israel’s self-defense and fight for its own survival.

Playing bad cop to Hooper’s good cop was his CAIR colleague, Nihad Awad, the co-founder and longtime national executive director of the unsavory organization. While Hooper talked humanitarianism, Awad was ready to hit Old Joe where it hurts and make sure that the addled corruptocrat understood exactly what was happening: "The language that President Biden and his party understand,” Awad thundered, “is the language of votes in the 2023 elections and our message is: No cease-fire, no votes."

Awad couldn’t have made his point more clearly if he had been in a plane, skywriting over the White House. He added: "No votes in Michigan, no votes in Arizona, no votes in Georgia, no votes in Nevada, no votes in Wisconsin, no votes in Pennsylvania." These were, of course, the states that allowed Old Joe to pretend to be president over the last three years. But not this time. Awad concluded: "No votes for you anywhere if you don’t call for a cease-fire now."

Awad was echoing the ever-winsome Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Ramallah), who asserted on Friday that “Joe Biden supported the genocide of the Palestinian people." Oh, you missed the genocide of the Palestinian people? That’s only because it never happened. The Palestinian people numbered close to two million in 1990, and they number over five today. That’s a 155% growth rate over thirty-two years, making Israel’s genocide of the Palestinians one of the most remarkably inefficient such operations in human history. Nonetheless, Tlaib, like the good leftist that she is, doubled down on her lie, adding: "The American people won’t forget. Biden, support a cease-fire now. Or don’t count on us in 2024.”

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Meanwhile, Meredith Weisel of the hard-left Anti-Defamation League offered a lamentably weak response, saying of the Washington demonstration: "There was zero acknowledgment of Israeli suffering and a lot of legitimizing and justification for violence against Israelis. Surely there are people there today who are responding to the humanitarian crisis. But most of the people we have seen on the stage have been justifying what happened on Oct. 7."

Related: The Biden Regime Is Now Setting Policy By Old Norm Macdonald Tweets

Not much better can be expected from the thoroughly compromised ADL, but Weisel missed the opportunity to point out that there actually was no “humanitarian crisis” in Gaza. While Hamas has been claiming that Gaza is on the brink of mass starvation, Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) issued a report Saturday that noted that “food reserves are sufficient for the near term. There is no food shortage. International organizations are permitted to bring food aid into the Gaza Strip.” Why trust Israel and not Hamas? Hamas has been shown repeatedly to be lying recently, most notoriously in claiming Israel hit a hospital and killed 500 people when it turned out that Palestinian Islamic Jihad hit a hospital parking lot with an errant rocket and killed ten people. Meanwhile, what Israel has stated about the conflict has been accurate.

 In any case, Old Joe and the Democrats are now caught between a rock and a hard place. If they abandon Israel utterly, they risk losing the votes of Jews and supporters of Israel, who still generally deny the evidence of their senses and vote Democrat. If, however, they continue to offer the weak support to Israel they’ve given so far, Tlaib and Awad will make good on their threats. The leftist/Islamic bloc, however, is caught between a rock and a hard place as well. If they don’t vote for Old Joe, for whom will they vote? The most pro-Israel president in history? How this game of chicken will play out is anybody’s guess.

Netanyahu: No ‘Pause,’ No Ceasefire, No Fuel For Gaza Unless Hostages Released

RICK MORAN | 8:57 AM ON NOVEMBER 04, 2023
SEE: https://pjmedia.com/rick-moran/2023/11/04/netanyahu-no-pause-no-ceasefire-no-fuel-for-gaza-unless-hostages-released-n4923620;Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.

AP Photo/Evan Vucci
"We won't stop until victory," said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a short, televised address on Friday. He told the Israeli people that he had rejected U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken's suggestion of a humanitarian "pause" in the fighting that does not include a release of their hostages. He also says Israel “will not enable the entry of fuel to Gaza.”

He promised that victory would be “sharp and clear” and would “resonate for generations.”

For the first time since the war began, we can see daylight between the U.S. and Israeli governments. As Israel continues to prosecute a war that, by necessity, is leading to a high civilian death toll, Israel's friends find it more and more difficult to give the Jewish state unqualified support.

I'm pretty sure Netanyahu was aware of this going into the war. It doesn't appear that anything the United States says or does will deter him from achieving his number one war aim: destroying Hamas so they can never threaten to security of the Israeli people again.

Times of Israel:

He says he told Blinken that “Israel refuses a temporary ceasefire that does not include the release of our hostages. Israel will not enable the entry of fuel to Gaza and opposes sending money to the Strip.”

He notes that Israel has lost hundreds of civilians and soldiers on and since October 7 — wonderful fighters, incredible Israelis… people who blocked these monsters with their bodies.”

He tells some of their stories and says they “sacrificed their lives for our lives.”

“We are trying to fight with minimal danger to our warriors, but we will do whatever is needed to defeat our enemies,” he concludes.

Indeed, the call for a "humanitarian pause" would only give Hamas time to regroup and dig in. And a pause would definitely do no favors for the Israeli and foreign hostages being held in Gaza. Netanyahu has no choice. All he has for leverage regarding the hostages is Israel's ability to make life absolutely miserable for Gazans. 

Hamas, of course, is doing fine. It's the Gazans who are suffering and even if public opinion turned against Hamas -- a remote possibility -- the terrorists wouldn't care. They're not at war to save the Palestinians or create a homeland for them. They are fighting a holy war to destroy Israel. 

Hamas certainly doesn't care about a "pause" except how they can use it to better their strategic position.

Wall Street Journal:

As Israeli forces have advanced, quickly encircling Gaza City and bearing down on tunnel networks and strongholds, Hamas would like nothing more than to slow them down.

It strains credibility to think Hamas wouldn’t use a pause to its advantage. Nor is Hamas likely to release all hostages and forfeit its best leverage. It may drag out negotiations, dribbling out hostages to win reprieve after reprieve, plus propaganda bumps.

The way to help Palestinian civilians isn’t to slow the Israeli advance. The less control Hamas has over Gaza’s streets, the more civilians can escape the fighting and the more aid can be brought in securely. The ground invasion has already allowed humanitarian assistance to ramp up, with more than 100 truckloads now arriving each day. Hamas would use freedom of action to keep civilians as shields and pilfer more aid—limiting what Israel can let in.

The fate of the hostages may be uncertain but they are possibly Hamas's last, most potent weapon. As their infrastructure and fighters are being systematically eliminated, Hamas's only hope for survival is the intercession of others — the United States in particular — who could use its influence to stop Israel short of their primary war aim of destroying Hamas.

At the moment, Biden is still — reluctantly — on board. But Biden is in a campaign for re-election and anything is possible if American public opinion changes.

At Least 200 Arrested In Grand Central Station Protest Demanding Israel-Hamas Cease-Fire

Protesters gather at Grand Central Terminal during a rally calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas on Friday, Oct. 27, 2023, in New York. (AP Photo/Jeenah Moon)

Protesters gather at Grand Central Terminal during a rally calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas on Friday, Oct. 27, 2023, in New York. (AP Photo/Jeenah Moon)

OAN’s Abril Elfi 
12:32 PM – Saturday, October 28, 2023

SEE: https://www.oann.com/newsroom/at-least-200-arrested-in-grand-central-station-protest-demanding-israel-hamas-cease-fire/;

Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.

At least 200 people have been arrested during a protest in the Grand Central Station in New York City demanding a cease-fire in the Israel-Palestine War.

Hundreds of activists, wearing black T-shirts with the slogans “Jews say cease-fire now” and “Not in our name,” were detained by New York Police Department (NYPD) officers and brought out of the train station, their hands zip-tied behind their backs during rush hour on Friday. 

The NYPD stated that the demonstrators were momentarily detained, issued summonses, and then released and that a more precise number of detentions would be available on Saturday.

Some protesters carried flags as they ascended the stone ledges in front of departure time leaderboards. 

After police broke up the sit-in, the remaining demonstrators streamed into the streets outside.

One of the groups involved appears to be a group called “Jewish Voices For Peace,” which posted on X, the social media formerly known as Twitter announcing that they are “taking over.” 

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) said in a statement that it is sad that the organization chose rush hour to organize a protest when New Yorkers were trying to get home, but it is proud of both MTA officers and NYPD officers for their professionalism.

Commuters were advised to use Penn Station as an option by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. 

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