“Oct 7 2023”

A storm has gathered over the Belgian Parliament for refusing to show a graphic video of the Hamas attack on 7 October, put together by the Israeli Government, due to a lack of consensus between MPs.

Unlike some neighbouring countries, the Belgian Parliament turned down an invitation by the Israeli Embassy on Tuesday to set up a screening of graphic videos of the Hamas terror attack on 7 October, which killed around 1400 people. It was the worst attack in Israel’s history.

Whilst MR, Les Engagés and N-VA were in favour of the screening, strong opposition came from the French-speaking Socialist Party (PS) – who argued it would be fairer to also show a reciprocal video on the violence against Palestinians. This stance was backed by the Belgian Green Parties (Ecolo/Groen) and the Belgian Worker’s Party (PTB/PVDA).

Damn socialists.

California police have arrested Loay Alnaji on an involuntary manslaughter charge for the death of Jewish protester Paul Kessler.

Kessler, 69, died after getting into an altercation with Alnaji at a protest in Thousand Oaks earlier this month.

An autopsy revealed he’d been hit in the face and died after hitting his head on the concrete sidewalk. Witnesses said Alnaji attacked him, causing him to fall.

Canada’s former foreign affairs minister, John Baird, said Justin Trudeau was responding to pressure from his own caucus members to shift to a more pro-Palestinian stance, when he called on Israel to use “maximum restraint” in Gaza.

“I think supporting Israel is not a popular thing in all quarters, but it’s the right thing. Trudeau has one eye on foreign policy and the other on the next election (because) a group of his MPs are getting increasingly nervous and increasingly concerned that they’re facing defeat.”

A man draped in an Israeli flag entered a High Park mosque on Monday and refused to leave until he was escorted out by Toronto police.

Toronto police said they received a call on Monday because of reports of an “unwanted guest” at Jami Mosque.

An elderly gentleman wearing #Israel flag was kicked out of a mosque in Toronto using police force while he wasn’t doing anything to bother anyone!
This is the true face of #Islam not what you see in mainstream media.
Muslims have ZERO tolerance for the slightest diversion from… pic.twitter.com/amcPWQziOT

— Nazanin (@nazanin7) November 16, 2023

H/T Sweetpea

Hypocrisy, double standards and a failure to understand the region. These are the charges being levelled at the West, primarily the US, by leaders of 57 Arab and Muslim countries who convened at the weekend in the Saudi capital Riyadh.

How is it, foreign ministers said to me, that the West slams Russia for killing civilians in Ukraine, yet, in their words, it “gives a green light to Israel to do the same in Gaza”?

In the luxurious surroundings of Riyadh’s Ritz-Carlton hotel, amid giant floral bouquets and glittering chandeliers, and a world away from the shattered landscape of Gaza, princes, presidents and prime ministers met for the Joint Arab Islamic Extraordinary Summit.

So how come they won’t accept Palestinian refugees?

I don’t know what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was thinking when he significantly changed his position on the Israel-Hamas war Tuesday evening during an event in B.C. unrelated to the conflict, but his choice of words and the way he structured them will fuel anti-Semitism in Canada.

Iran’s supreme leader told the head of Hamas in a face-to-face meeting in Tehran that his country would not enter the war with Israel and accused the terror group of not giving any prior warning of the Oct 7 attacks.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told Ismail Haniyeh that Iran – a longtime backer of Hamas – would continue to lend the group its political and moral support, but would not intervene directly, according to three Iranian and Hamas officials with knowledge of the discussions who asked to remain anonymous.

Hamas is losing badly, but what the Ayatollah says and what he does are different things.

Over a month later, Israeli authorities are still identifying the remains of those killed in the Oct. 7 terrorist attack by Hamas — that’s how brutal, sadistic and ruthless the violence was that day. One of those victims was Canadian-Israeli peace activist Vivian Silver, who was 74 years old.

Three hours before dawn, witnesses and doctors inside Gaza’s largest hospital reported that Israeli tanks had entered the sprawling medical compound on the western edge of Gaza City. “We can see them pointing the guns of the tanks toward the hospital … they are inside the complex with the tanks,” Khader Al Za’anoun, a reporter for the Palestinian news agency Wafa, told CNN.

Munir al-Boursh, a doctor inside the Dar al-Shifa hospital and a Palestinian health ministry undersecretary, had earlier appealed to approaching Israeli forces to exercise caution. “You being inside the hospital will create a state of fear and hysteria among the patients here,” he told the Israel Defense Forces in a phone call obtained by Al Jazeera. “All floors of the hospital are full of people from floor one through to six.”

7 minute one-shot unedited IDF tour of Al-Shifa hospital with your tour guide @jconricus pic.twitter.com/IEYgjrCtxF

— The Mossad: Satirical, Yet Awesome (@TheMossadIL) November 15, 2023

I recently had a perplexing encounter with some American exchange students at a brasserie in Brussels. They had just come from a pro-Palestine protest, and none of them could understand my support for Israel. When I asked them how they could attend such a protest after the atrocities of 7 October, one of them countered with: ‘How do you know that 7 October even happened?’

The residents of kibbutzes near Gaza dreamt of a two-state solution with their Palestinian neighbours – then the Oct 7 attacks began…

There used to be a saying among those Israelis who lived in the communities next to the border with Gaza, commonly said with a shrug as missiles flew overhead: “We live in paradise 95 per cent of the time. The other 5 per cent is hell.”

The paradise was all too clear for them: loving communities where those living next door felt more like family than neighbours; gorgeous scenery overlooking the arid majesty of the Negev desert; a still quietness that would only be pierced by the laughter of children playing.

Gaza situation ‘heartbreaking,’ says Freeland when asked about Netanyahu’s rebuke

OTTAWA – The situation in the Gaza Strip is “heartbreaking,” Canada’s deputy prime minister said Wednesday, the day after Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rebuked Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for urging Israel to show the highest level of restraint in the besieged Palestinian territory.

“I think everyone would agree that the humanitarian situation in Gaza is heartbreaking. It’s really difficult to see the images of what’s happening,” Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland told reporters Wednesday in Mascouche, Que.

Freeland, who is also the federal finance minister, had been asked to respond to Netanyahu calling out Trudeau on Tuesday evening, hours after he had urged Israel’s government to “exercise maximum restraint” in its war against Hamas, which has included regular airstrikes in Gaza.