By Post Editorial Board | New York Post
Neocon: Israel’s Breaking Narrative
“Israel’s much anticipated raid on Gaza” should “reset many people’s prior assumptions about the IDF’s war conduct — and Hamas’s,” argues Commentary’s Seth Mandel. “Events have borne out Israel’s account of the war in three key ways”: “Al-Shifa hospital and others are used by Hamas’s military”; “Hamas was specifically using patients in the hospital as human shields”; and “when Israel says it is undertaking a surgical mission, it is telling the truth.” And “one assumption about the war that might be proved misguided,” namely that “Israel’s delay of a ground invasion was self-defeating and evidence of indecision.” “It’s far too early to make a definitive judgment, but the IDF’s battlefield successes suggest its planning was strategically sound and that the Biden administration’s patient support will be vindicated.”
Foreign desk: A ‘Gaza’ Emerging Inside France
French National Assembly members are “in shock” after watching video of the Hamas’ 10/7 massacre, reports Michel Gurfinkiel at The New York Sun. Yet President Emmanuel Macron, who surely knew of the film’s content, “spoke as if Israel were the aggressor.” He later apologized, but Hamas atrocities have reignited memories of the Islamic terror in France, such as its 2015 “Black Sabbath” nightmare, when 130 people were killed at the Bataclan and other sites. “France is being challenged from within by a Gaza of her own: an increasingly assertive Muslim minority that rejects the mainstream French way of life.” What if this minority engages in “all-out warfare” — with “help, arguably, from non-Muslim woke friends?” Islamist separatism “is the key issue” today; France’s next president “will have to address it without wavering.”
From the right: Biden’s Open-Borders Pain
“Are terrorists among the millions of illegal migrants who pour across our border under Joe Biden?” asks Steve Cortes at Newsweek. Yes! A man wanted for terrorism in Senegal “was arrested in New York City last month” two weeks after “crossing from Mexico into Arizona, unvetted and unencumbered.” A survey of swing-state voters in Arizona, Wisconsin, Georgia, and North Carolina “found that the immigration/border issue is the second most important topic on voters’ minds, trailing only the economy”: 68% said “they are concerned about the lack of current border control” which has turned every jurisdiction into “border states.” The voters who’ll decide “the 2024 election cycle demand security and American sovereignty.”
China watch: Will Xi Be ‘King of the World’?
China is “experiencing tepid growth,” anemic industrial production and “increasingly alienated youth,” but Xi Jinping “appears to be wearing the crown,” quips Joel Kotkin at UnHerd. Western leaders, by contrast, are “doing nothing to impress” — and that includes “the doddering Joe Biden.” Following a climate deal, the demands for more green products will assure China’s “industrial supremacy,” even as it emits “more greenhouse gases than the entire developed world put together.” Beijing “has found many ‘useful idiots’ in the American establishment,” including within the Biden family. And Xi now has “a freer hand militarily”: If he can take over Taiwan before the West can replicate the key components it produces, he’ll “truly be king of the world.”
Libertarian: Feds’ Hefty Gifts to Elite Unis
“The government should reconsider the money it gives to private institutions,” because “universities sitting on multibillion-dollar war chests should shoulder more of the burden for their own expenditures,” notes Reason’s Joe Lancaster. A new OpenTheBooks.com report shows that in 2018-’22, 10 elite universities “received $33.1 billion” in federal cash, with “more than $28.9 billion” of it “distributed as grants,” fund the school’s own projects. But “the universities in question are nominally meant to be funded by student tuition and donations,” and “most also have generous endowments.” In fact, “in the five years during which the 10 universities” got the $33 billion, “they also grew their collective endowments by $64.8 billion.” That casts “doubt on whether this money is truly necessary.”