Op-Ed by David Cozocaru: Admin of Israel Realtime

 

August 1, 2025

🧠 ISRAEL MUST LEAD—NOT JUST SURVIVE

Nearly 22 months have passed since the October 7 massacre—the deadliest attack on Jews since the Holocaust. Over 1,200 civilians and soldiers were murdered. Entire families were incinerated. Babies were decapitated. Women were gang-raped—some beside the bodies of their children. Holocaust survivors were dragged bleeding into captivity. Soldiers were executed in their sleep.

More than 250 civilians and soldiers were abducted into Gaza. Fifty hostages remain. Children. Parents. Elderly. Holocaust survivors. Forgotten by the world.

Held underground in Hamas tunnels, they are denied sunlight, medicine, and increasingly, food. Many are now being left to starve in darkness, while Hamas leaders dine on stolen humanitarian aid. There is food in Gaza—Hamas has it. The hostages do not.

And yet, international pressure focuses on Israeli restraint rather than the survival of these innocent hostages.

🎗️ 22 MONTHS. 50 HOSTAGES. GLOBAL SILENCE.

Where is the outrage?

Where is the Red Cross?

Where are the international journalists?

If these hostages were European, UN planes would be landing daily.

But they are Jewish. So they are ignored.

Their families live in torment.

The world scrolls on.

We must not.

🏛️ THE UN PREPARES TO RECOGNIZE A PALESTINIAN STATE—WHILE HOSTAGES REMAIN IN GAZA

Next month, at the UN General Assembly, global leaders are preparing to formally recognize a Palestinian state.

Not to demand the release of hostages.

Not to sanction Hamas.

Not to investigate the October 7 massacre.

But to reward terror.

How can statehood be granted while victims of mass murder still rot in tunnels?

What message does this send other than: “Massacre Jews, get borders”?

This is not a peace plan.

It is appeasement.

It is the political legitimization of barbarism.

 

💥 THIS IS A REGIONAL WAR—NOT JUST GAZA

This war didn’t begin in Gaza—and it won’t end there. Israel is battling a coordinated, Iran-backed, eight-front assault:

1. Gaza – Hamas fights like a militia and continues to regroup.

2. Judea and Samaria – Iran and Hamas incite armed cells to destabilize from within.

3. Lebanon – Hezbollah has paused mass rocket fire, but Israel continues striking operatives daily.

4. Syria – Iranian militias are embedded and preparing for future escalation.

5. Yemen – The Houthis launch long-range missiles, including a direct strike on Ben Gurion Airport.

6. Cyberwarfare – Iranian proxies target Israel’s healthcare, civil, and military systems.

7. Information warfare – Hamas dominates global media. Israel lags behind.

 8. Iran itself – A 12-day war saw Iran firing missiles—including nuclear-capable ones—from its own soil. The war ended, but the nuclear threat remains. The region sits on a powder keg.

This is not a border dispute.

This is a fight for survival.

And by extension, a defense of the West’s values.

 

🧠 ISRAEL MUST GO ON OFFENSE—WITH VISION AND CLARITY

The lessons of October 7 must become action.

No more defense-only. No more reactive strategy.

 

Here’s what Israel must do:

1. Reframe the War

Stop calling it a “conflict.” This is a multi-front war against Iranian imperialism.

2. Put the Hostages First

Every speech, every press conference, every foreign meeting should start with:

“There are still 50 hostages in Gaza—children, soldiers, Holocaust survivors.”

3. Enforce Red Lines

If Hezbollah rebuilds—strike.

If the Houthis attack Tel Aviv—respond decisively.

Proportionality is a Western luxury. Deterrence is our oxygen.

4. Launch a 24/7 AI Response Unit

Israel needs a multilingual, real-time task force to detect disinformation, counter propaganda, and empower allies with verified truth.

5. Own the Humanitarian Narrative

Israel sends food into Gaza.

Hamas steals it.

Film it. Share it. Don’t stay silent.

6. Mobilize the Jewish Diaspora and Global Allies

Silence abroad weakens us at home.

It’s time for truth—not apology. Courage—not fear.

✊ DRAWING A LINE IN THE SAND

To the West:

If you cannot condemn baby beheadings without saying “but what about…”—you are not neutral. You are complicit.

To the UN and global institutions:

You are legitimizing a would-be state whose “leaders” burned families alive.

History will remember.

To the Jewish people:

This is our defining hour. Speak. Stand. Refuse to disappear.

To Israel’s leaders:

We are not here to survive headlines.

We are here to define the future.

 

FINAL WORD: FROM THE ASHES TO RESOLVE

Israel was not reborn to merely exist.

We are here to live with purpose—and lead with clarity.

 

Let the world remember:

We did not start this war.

But we will define how it ends.

Not in the shadows of October 7—

But in the light of unshakable resolve.

For the hostages.

For the fallen.

For the truth.

For the future.

 

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When the Farhud Came to Be’eri

The Iraqi Jewish community, the oldest such community outside of Israel, has a

history spanning over 2,600 years. Hundreds of years before the 7^th century Muslim occupation, Jewish communities had existed in this region. The Jews shared the Arab culture with their Muslim and Christian neighbors, but they lived in separate communities. Jewish assimilation into Muslim society was rare.

Under centuries of Islamic rule Jews were classified as dhimmis (‘second class citizens’). The crumbling Ottoman Empire gave them more equality. By 1884, 30,000 Jews lived in Baghdad. By 1900, the number had risen to 50,000, with Jews representing over a quarter of the city’s total population.

Brittain ‘created’ Iraq after WWI (Jordan is also a similar British 'invention'.) The modern, secular and almost democratic state became independent 1932.  Iraqi Jews worked as lawyers, musicians, economists, accountants, academics, artists, and intellectuals. The fact that numerous Jews held key positions in public office, was resented by their Muslim compatriots.

In the 1940s about 135,000 Jews lived in Iraq (nearly 3 percent of the total population), with about 90,000 in Baghdad, 10,000 in Basra, and the remainder scattered throughout many small towns and villages.

In 1933, Germany acquired Iraqi Christian newspaper Al-Alam Al-Araby (The Arab World) and began publishing a serialized Arabic translation of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf. In 1939, Mufti Haj Amin al-Husseini of Jerusalem fled Palestine disguised as a woman. The Kingdom of Iraq welcomed him with gifts and money. His pro-Nazi propaganda and violent radio incitement against Jews resulted in racial Jewish laws, mass dismissal from public posts, discrimination and harassment in the streets.

On April 19, 1941, Britain declared war and tried to regain control of the region by occupying Basra. This resulted in widespread looting of many Jewish owned bazaar shops. Arab night watchmen protected Jewish possessions and many Moslems protected Jews in their homes.

During this time, four Iraqi officers, known as the “Golden Square,” carried out a coup to install Rashid A. al-Gaylani, a strident supporter of the Axis powers, as prime minister.

In the last week of May 1941, in Bagdad, Jewish homes were marked with a red palm print ("Hamsa"). They were instructed to pack suitcases and to wait to be taken to "detention camps for their own safety".  

May 30, Rabbi Sasson Khaduri, the community leader, was told that, as a ‘protective‘ measure, the Jews were to stay home for the next three days. Plans for a larger massacre failed when the self-proclaimed governor was forced to flee the country.

When the military coup failed, Gaylani fled to Berlin, where Hitler warmly received him. Radio Baghdad announced exiled members of the royal family were returning very soon. British and Transjordanian forces were surrounding the capital and it was only a matter of days before they restored law and order. The relieved Jewish community thought it was safe to celebrate Shavuot.

On June 1^st, as they left synagogue on the eve of the Shavuot festival, a crowd awaited them with batons, daggers and swords. 

Many of the Jewish houses and shops marked with the red Hamsa were ransacked and entire families were murdered by the mob. Jews trying to escape were pulled out of the vehicles and slaughtered. Synagogue windows were smashed, Torah scrolls desecrated, crazed mobs chased Jews with daggers and swords. Students and armed police joined the massacre. Survivors testified of policemen breaking into houses and slaughtering Jews, cutting off limbs and looting jewelry. Men had their genitals cut off and stuffed in their mouths. Women were raped and had their bellies slashed while still alive. Children were thrown into the river and wells. People were thrown off rooftops and the crazed mob delighted in hearing the cries of the stricken and tormented Jews. 

What became known as the Farhud pogrom lasted for two days when Iraqi troops finally restored order. Throughout the onslaught, British troops, who were on the outskirts of the city, didn’t lift a finger to help.

The highest death toll was amongst Jews living in self-segregated areas. Many of those living in mixed Muslim-Jewish neighborhoods survived because of the bravery of their Muslim neighbors who protected them. 

Mordechai Ben-Porat, a Jew who later served as an Israeli government minister, described his experiences:

“We were mostly cut off from the center of the Jewish community ... It was because of one Muslim neighbor that we survived the Farhud. We had no weapons to defend ourselves and were utterly helpless. We put furniture up against the doors and windows to prevent the rioters from breaking in.... For two days, the streets flowed with blood. The cries of the Jews were heard all over the city ... and finally bodies piled up in a huge mass grave. As well as Jews being killed and wounded, many hundreds of Jewish-owned properties were destroyed with around 1,500 homes and stores broken into, ransacked, and set ablaze. Damages to property were estimated at some $3 million (US$ 51 million in 2019).

The Farhud triggered the mass emigration of Iraqi Jews. 

Through the clandestine underground immigration movement, some 120,000 people – 90 percent of Iraq's Jews were brought to the young Jewish State through Operation Ezra and Nehemiah (1950 and 1952). Today, fewer than ten Jews remain in the country.

On the eve of Yom Kippur 1946, members of the “Babylonians” – an Iraqi youth group- settled in Nahabir. 

Shortly after breaking ground, the Zionist government asked some of the “Babylonians” to return to Iraq to prepare additional young men and women to make Aliyah. Kibbutz Be’eri, established a few miles west of today’s location, was part of the “11 points plan”.

Yaakov Tzemach, member of the Baghdad HeChalutz youth movement was trained by the “Babylonians”.

Later, after joining the IDF, Yaakov was part of the Israeli army’s Nahal agricultural settlement program, which sent a group to help strengthen Kibbutz Be’eri in the early 1950s.

Every Shavuot eve, Yaakov Tzemach would tell his family and Kibbutz Be’eri members the story of the 1941 Farhud pogrom. Yaakov’s family too, survived the massacre thanks to an older Muslim woman who physically blocked the way to their house and prevented the rioters from entering.

The cooking in the Kibbutz kitchen was also influenced by the Iraqi immigrants: “Even the gefilte fish was done in Mizrahi style.” Iraqi born Avraham Dvori (Manchar) was eight years old when he arrived at the kibbutz, where everyone spoke Hebrew. “I entirely forgot the Arabic I knew from home,” he said. His family of five children and 15 grandchildren also live in Beeri. “We have members from over 30 countries of origin. Everyone is mixed with everyone - this is the Land of Israel for me. This is what gives the kibbutz a sense of warmth.”

After the Farhud, the Jewish community set up a monument in Bagdad’s Jewish cemetery to mark the location of a mass grave. 

This monument was later destroyed by the Iraqi government. 

A replica of this monument was set up nearby the Be’eri forest. 

On October 7, this forest was used by Hamas terrorists as a staging area before moving to attack Be’eri and other nearby communities.

That Simchat Torah, Yaakov’s grandson, Shachar, was part of Be’eri’s civilian emergency defense squad. He took part in a heroic and desperate defensive battle for many hours, before he was eventually killed.

Yaakov Tzemach ob”m (right), survivor of the Farhud, Shachar Tzemach ob”m (center) killed on October 7, with one of the family girls in his lap, and Doron Tzemach (left), member of Kibbutz Be’eri. From a family album.

“We made Aliyah from Iraq to Israel so that Arabs wouldn't be able to enter Jewish homes and murder us.”  

Eighty two years later, the Farhud had returned to Be’eri.

 

Monument "Prayer" in Ramat Gan in memory of the Jews who were killed in Iraq in the Pogrom "Farhud" (1941) and in the 1960s

********************************

Article research/sources:

https://blog.nli.org.il/en/farhud_beeri/?_atscid=3_2269_201328224_10387477_0_Txtz3xaxxdshdasussp&utm_source=activetrail&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=%20English%20Newsletter%20-%2004.07.2024

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/the-farhud

https://shc.stanford.edu/arcade/interventions/farhud-forgotten-ordeal-iraqi-jews

https://israelforever.org/interact/blog/remember-farhud-iraq-jews/

https://honestreporting.com/farhud-massacre-ended-iraqs-2600-year-old-jewish-community/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farhud

 

https://youtu.be/DnXSOQqzaKA?si=re1TpIsLAngokZz5

 

Yom Kippur Deja Vu

Article circulated by email, written by Shalom Pollack, Israeli tour guide

During the "Simchat Torah" service at the "hesder yeshiva" in Hispin (on the Golan Heights) on Shabbat, October 7, I experienced something very similar fifty years ago. Call it deja vu.

A half a century ago I was an "exchange " student at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. 

On Yom Kippur of 1973, I was lying down during the afternoon synagogue break when the most unexpected thing occurred;

I heard sirens.

After inquiring of Danny, my Israeli floor counselor, what it could possibly mean, he said "oh sheet! Dis means war man"!

After the first astonished moment I reassured myself that if those stupid Arabs really did attack us again, we would beat them as quickly as we did in the last wars. Our air force would stop them in their tracks no doubt. (Former air force chief, Ezer Weizman said that after the Six day War, the next one would be the “Six Minute" war)

I was not afraid and I was not alone in my confidence and arrogance.

 

Israel has never quite recovered from that war which we in fact almost did lose. To this day the experts are still arguing about how we were caught so off guard as to allow the Arab enemy to catch us by surprise and quickly wash over our sophisticated, impenetrable "Bar Lev" line along the Suez Canal.

Thousands of our soldiers were slaughtered. Israel was almost destroyed.

In real time, we did not know just how close we were to destruction. There was no social media at the time

 

Never again would we be so complacent or miscalculate and underestimate our enemy. 

No more surprises.

Never again

 

Israel was supposed to have learned her lesson and changed its attitude; always be prepared for a similar. Surprise, always.

 

Yesterday while praying together with the special young men of the hesder yeshiva (where they combine army service and Torah study) a young man, rifle strapped across his back, approached the Rosh yeshiva(dean) and exchanged a few words accompanied by very serious expressions. A few moments later he announced to the young congregation that all those in certain units should have their phones open and ready for instructions.

 He said, “It seems there is some tension in the south, but God willing it will all be well."

 

My thoughts were actually similar to those I had fifty years ago, almost to the day.

 

I was used to the periodic "rounds" with Hamas in Gaza.

The scenario is familiar to all by now. 

They decide when another: “round " begins. They shoot rockets at our civilians near the border. Our people hide in terror. We shoot back, making every effort not to God forbid hurt anyone until they agree to a ceasefire. 

After closing their lifeline line with Israel for a couple of days we resume the transfer of goods and money used to rebuild and restock their arsenals, for another round timed at their choosing 

 

This is the pattern ever since Israel expelled thousands of Jews from Gaza and left the entire area to the Arabs who turned it into a terror fortress. That was supposed to bring peace.

 

I remember clearly the day in the summer of 2005 (Tisha Ba'av) that the Jewish pioneers of faith and courage were dragged from their homes by the Sharon government supported by willing underlings, including the "elites' and army command. They joyously pointed to the naked emperor’s very fine clothes.

 

As the wretched Jews were dragged and shoved out of their homes onto the road of exile their neighbors in the Leftist kibbutzim along the Gaza border jeered and mocked at the misfortune of their fellow Jews.

They were different, after all.

The religious Jews that brought Jewish blessing to the biblical lands were just not their type. They were "messianic" , religious,   unashamedly patriotic.. 

They had no place in a promising new progressive post Zionist, post Jewish world. No room for obstacles to peace with our neighbors.

 Those types are, "Not my brother."

 

Yesterday, I had no idea that Israel would make the same fatal mistake as they did half a century ago.

But It happened again.

Thousands of Hamas terrorists managed to penetrate the world’s most most sophisticated defense network along the Gaza border (remember the peace border of the 2005 expulsions?)

For half a day the terrorists swarmed over  the  border unopposed, entering  at will ito an  entire string of Jewish communities facing Gaza and proceeded to murder , torture, rape and abduct thousands of  Jews.

 Never since the Holocaust have more Jews been slaughtered in one day.

 Never since the Final Solution were Jews hunted down in their homes as they quivered at the sound of their killers breaking into their hiding spots to quarry the Jews. Not until yesterday

 

Read that again.

 

That was just Saturday, October 7, 2023, a half century after; it would never happen again.

 

This time it was far worse than the Yom Kippur debacle.

Whole families were terrorized and murdered. 

In 1973 the civilians were safe behind the lines. It was soldiers who were slaughtered and captured

Yesterday civilians were in the lines.

 

How could it have happened?

What are the possibilities?

 

One - Israel’s entire political, military and intelligence communities didn't just fail but were criminally derelict in the utmost extreme. Somehow, they were blinded and deaf.

How likely is that?

 

So, what is it?

 

The wakeup calls of Yom Kippur half a century ago clearly did not work

 

Will it work this time?

Shared with permission. 

shalompollack613@gmail, com

tour guide and author

"Jews, Israelis and Arabs"