Author Archives: Dana Pico

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Journolism: When the credentialed media fail in their duties They want to "speak truth to power," but only when it doesn't interfere with their political preferences

When I was a teenager in Mt Sterling, Kentucky, I delivered the morning Lexington Herald and the afternoon Lexington Leader, back in those quill pen and inkwell days when the Lexington newspapers were actually delivered throughout central and eastern Kentucky. Now the print editions of the combined Lexington Herald-Leader, published only thrice a week on Wednesdays, Fridays and (ostensibly) Sundays but actually delivered on Saturdays, are delivered via the United States Postal Service in the mail; no more paperboys! The Herald was “moderately liberal” while the Leader was “conservative” in their editorial stances, but by the mid-1980s, after the two dailies merged to form the Herald-Leader, my now late best friend started calling them the Herald-Liberal.

Nevertheless, my recollections of the newspaper back then never had it as blatantly partisan as what I see in the newspapers of today.

We learned in journalism classes — though I was a staffer for the Kentucky Kernel, the university’s student newspaper, in the early 1980s, I was not a journalism major — that journalists were supposed to be independent, even-handed, and impartial in their work. The term “yellow journalism” was often misapplied, but we were supposed to eschew:

In journalism, yellow journalism and the yellow press are American newspapers that use eye-catching headlines and sensationalized exaggerations for increased sales. The English term is chiefly used in the US. In the United Kingdom, a similar term is tabloid journalism. Other languages, e.g. Russian (Жёлтая пресса zhyoltaya pressa), sometimes have terms derived from the American term. Yellow journalism emerged in the intense battle for readers by two newspapers in New York City in 1890s. It was not common in other cities.

Joseph Pulitzer purchased the New York World in 1883 and told his editors to use sensationalism, crusades against corruption, and lavish use of illustrations to boost circulation. William Randolph Hearst then purchased the rival New York Journal in 1895. They engaged in an intense circulation war, at a time when most men bought one copy every day from rival street vendors shouting their paper’s headlines. The term “yellow journalism” originated from the innovative popular “Yellow Kid” comic strip that was published first in the World and later in the Journal.

This type of reporting was characterized by exaggerated headlines, unverified claims, partisan agendas, and a focus on topics like crime, scandal, sports, and violence. Historians have debated whether Yellow journalism played a large role in inflaming public opinion about Spain’s atrocities in Cuba at the time, and perhaps pushing the U.S. into the Spanish-American War of 1898. Most historians say it did not do so. The two papers reached a working class Democratic audience, and the nation’s upscale Republican decision makers (such as President William McKinley and leaders in Congress) seldom read the Yellow press.

The use of partisan newspapers had a long history in the 20th century, with the Soviet Communists publishing Правда (Pravda, which means ‘truth’ in Russian) and Известия (Izvestia, which means ‘news’ in Russian), to spread their propaganda. Beginning in 1920, the Nazi party in Germany began publishing the Völkischer Beobachter (literally ‘People’s Observer,’ but by ‘Völkisch‘, the people to which it refers are not everyone, but ethnic German nationalists, a term which excluded Jews) to spread, eventually successfully, their political arguments.

During the post-World War II era, newspapers strove to keep their editorial and reportorial functions separate. Among the most notable newspapers in the country, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and several others, the editorial slant was obviously to the liberal side, though rarely wild-eyed, far-out leftism. The Wall Street Journal, on the other hand, was more conservative in its editorial department. But in none of those great newspapers were there serious questions about the accuracy of their reporting. Their biases did inevitably creep in, but that was primarily evident in what they chose to cover, rather than the accuracy of what was reported.

Today? As this site reported on Friday evening, the readers and subscribers of The Washington Post have waxed wroth because the newspaper, under the instructions of owner Jeff Bezos, declined to endorse anyone for President, the left being absotively, posilutely incensed that they didn’t endorse Kamala Harris Emhoff. Teeth have been gnashed, garments have been rent, and subscriptions have been cancelled.

Cancelled subscriptions? That’s what really gets to the reporters. CNN’s Jake Tapper tweeted:

Canceling a newspaper subscription helps politicians who don’t want oversight, does nothing to hurt the billionaires who own the newspapers and make decisions with which you may disagree, and will result in fewer journalists trying to hold the powerful to account.

Washington Post columnist Karen Attiah tweeted:

I didn’t sign up to be a journalist to be silent on what matters most.

I didn’t come here to be a coward. Some of us really, truly believe in speaking truth to power.

We were betrayed today.

Herein lays the problem: the mission of a true journalist shouldn’t be “speaking truth to power,” but to report the news impartially. How are we to have confidence that you are reporting the truth impartially when you blatantly support one position over another? Miss Attiah apparently aspires to the status of journolist, not journalist.

The members of the credentialed media mostly knew of President Joe Biden’s continuing mental decline, but, rather than “hold(ing) the powerful to account” and “speaking truth to power,” they kept their mouths, and keyboards, quiet. The stories of Mr Biden’s slow descent into dementia were many and obvious, but only in independent blogs and on social media; of the credentialed media, the New York Post is the only one I can recall which ever mentioned it. Fox News probably did as well, but as I don’t watch television news — my hearing is so poor that I have to rely on reading the news — and the left-leaning media said virtually nothing.

Remember: they covered up for Hillary Clinton as well, her several falls and then her brief lapse into catatonia, minimizing what they couldn’t completely hide.

If you only paid attention to CNN and the major newspapers, you would never have known that President Biden was zombifying, and it’s all because the media were so consumed with #TrumpDerangementSyndrome that they didn’t want to say anything which might hurt his prospects for re-election, right up until the time of his infamous debate performance, when it was exposed to the American public.

“Speaking truth to power” means telling us all of the truth, including truths which do not fit with your political preferences. That’s what Mr Tapper and Miss Attiah and the vast majority of the journolists who were aware of his conditions failed to do.

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The butthurt children on the left.

I’ve never read Stephen King’s books. While he’s obviously a talented writer, to judge from the enormous sales he’s earned, it’s not that I am somehow boycotting his books due to his well-known liberal opinions, but simply that his particular niche, horror novels, just doesn’t appeal to me.

So, what has led to Mr King’s fit of pique?

The Washington Post says it will not endorse a candidate for president

Publisher William Lewis explained the decision as a return to the newspaper’s roots.

By Manuel Roig-Franzia and Laura Wagner | Friday, October 25, 2024 | 1:09 PM EDT | Updated: 8:17 PM EDT

The Washington Post’s publisher said Friday that the paper will not make an endorsement in this year’s presidential contest, for the first time in 36 years, or in future presidential races.

The decision, announced 11 days before an election that most polls show as too close to call, drew immediate and heated condemnation from a wide swath of subscribers, political figures and media commentators. Robert Kagan, a longtime Post columnist and editor-at-large in the opinion department, resigned in protest, and a group of 11 Washington Post columnists co-signed an article condemning the decision. Angry readers and sources flooded the email inboxes of numerous staffers with complaints.

In a column published on The Post’s website Friday, publisher and CEO William Lewis described the decision as a return to the newspaper’s roots of non-endorsement. The Post did not begin regularly endorsing presidential candidates until 1976, when the paper endorsed Jimmy Carter “for understandable reasons at the time,” Lewis wrote.

“We recognize that this will be read in a range of ways, including as a tacit endorsement of one candidate, or as a condemnation of another, or as an abdication of responsibility. That is inevitable,” Lewis wrote. “We don’t see it that way. We see it as consistent with the values The Post has always stood for and what we hope for in a leader: character and courage in service to the American ethic, veneration for the rule of law, and respect for human freedom in all its aspects.”

There’s more at the original.

Naturally, the left waxed wroth, as the newspaper’s Editorial Board already had a draft endorsement of Kamala Harris Emhoff in hand, and the order came down from on high: owner Jeff Bezos, the billionaire founder of Amazon.com, ordered the change. Only two days earlier, Patrick Soon-Shiong, the billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Times, blocked a planned endorsement of Mrs Emhoff, which led to the resignation of editorials editor Mariel Garza, editorial writer Karin Klein, and Pulitzer Prize-winner Robert Greene. The Post’s editor-at-large Robert Kagan quit, and other resignations are expected. The Spectator mused:

Of most interest to Cockburn, however, were the remarks of fellow columnist and MSNBC mainstay Jennifer Rubin to the LA Times resignations earlier in the week. In response to Sewell Chan’s resignation from the Times, she wrote, “Bravo. All respect.” Followed by, “and where are the rest of them?”

LOL! Mrs Rubin has now put herself in the position of either having to resign, or proving herself what we already knew she is, a total hypocrite. From Wikipedia:

Rubin has been one of the most vocal conservative writers to criticize Donald Trump, as well as the overall behavior of the Republican Party during Trump’s term in office. Rubin denounced Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the 2015 Paris Agreement as “a dog whistle to the far right”, and designed to please his “climate change denial, right-wing base that revels in scientific illiteracy.” Previously, after Barack Obama had approved the agreement, Rubin characterized it as “nonsense” and argued that it would not achieve anything. Rubin described Trump’s 2017 decision to not implement parts of the Iran nuclear deal as the “emotional temper tantrum of an unhinged president.” She had previously said that “if you examine the Iran deal in any detail, you will be horrified as to what is in there.” Rubin strongly supported the United States officially recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moving its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Early in his presidency, she criticized Trump for not doing so, saying that it was indicative of his tendency to “never keep his word.” She concluded that Trump “looks buffoonish in his hasty retreat”. In December 2017, after Trump announced that he would move the embassy, she said it was “a foreign policy move without purpose.”

Also read: Robert Stacy McCain, “The Schadenfreude Smorgasbord“

Fourteen opinion columnists of the Post wrote that the decision not to make an endorsement — meaning: an endorsement of Mrs Emhoff — “is a terrible mistake,” but that, to me, brought a smile to my face. In all of this, I mused that perhaps Dr Soon-Shiong and Mr Bezos had devised a nefarious plot to reduce expenses at their newspapers, as some veteran columnists have, and might still, leave their jobs, without the owners having to fire them.

Does the Post really need fourteen opinion columnists?

Semafor reported:

One person familiar with the figures told Semafor that the decision already seemed to be impacting subscriptions. In the 24 hours ending Friday afternoon, about 2,000 subscribers canceled their subscriptions, an unusually high number, an employee said.

So, Stephen King and “Meathead” Rob Reiner and a bunch of other people have cancelled their subscriptions. Yet, had conservatives announced a bunch of subscription cancellations following the newspaper’s endorsements of Democrats — every presidential endorsement the Post has made has been for the Democratic candidate — the left would have called it childish petulance. The Philadelphia Inquirer just endorsed Mrs Emhoff, but I’m not going to cancel my subscription over that. It was something that everyone who reads the Inky expected.

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No wonder Israel doesn’t trust the United Nations

Either the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, UNRWA, didn’t properly check Mohammad Abu Itiwi’s background, something which would be hugely improper considering the circumstances in which the UN worked in Gaza prior to the war, or they just didn’t care, or the UNRWA leadership in Gaza knew who and what he was, and were deliberately providing Hamas with ‘civilian’ cover.

In one way, it really doesn’t matter: the outcome was the same, a Hamas commander was given wide access, wages, access to UN vehicles, and civilian cover. Is it any wonder that the Israeli government do not trust the United Nations and its various organizations and projects? Continue reading →

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Once again, I was right: the Lexington Herald-Leader has endorsed all Democrats.

On October 4th, I engaged in a Twitter — I refuse to call it 𝕏 — conversation with Rick Green, the executive editor of what passes for my closest newspaper, the Lexington Herald-Leader, concerning newspaper’s endorsements of candidates. In a response to Daniel Pearson, the primary editorial writer for The Philadelphia Inquirer, I wrote:

How much good do you think newspaper endorsements actually do? My ‘local’ newspaper, the Lexington @heraldleader, will endorse every Democrat running in the Sixth District, and every last one of them, other than for small districts, will lose. @EditorRAG

Mr Green responded, with a quoted retweet:

Well, considering our editorial board hasn’t yet interviewed all the candidates, your predictions may be flawed. The endorsement process allows us to ask tough questions + probe deeper on visions + platforms than most voters get to hear. Our report-out in the form of endorsements is designed to inform voters, not direct them for whom to vote.

Was my prediction wrong? Continue reading →

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World War III Watch: North Korean troops are ‘training’ in Russia

With the presidential election only twelve days away, this story is not getting nearly as much traction as it should have. From The Washington Post:

North Korean troops are in Russia, would be ‘legitimate targets’ in Ukraine, U.S. says

Citing newly declassified intelligence, the Biden administration said that at least 3,000 personnel are undergoing combat training in Russia, though it is unclear if they’ll join the war.

By Dan Lamothe, Missy Ryan, and Michelle Ye Hee Lee | Wednesday, October 23, 2024 | 6:20 AM EDT | Updated: 5:56 PM EDT

The U.S. government has evidence that at least 3,000 North Korean soldiers are in Russia receiving training, senior Biden administration officials said Wednesday, a development they said could have global implications and make those troops “legitimate military targets” in Ukraine should they enter the ongoing war there.

The disclosure, which officials said is based on newly declassified U.S. intelligence, coincides with similar pronouncements in recent days from the governments of Ukraine and South Korea. NATO and the United States had not previously confirmed the North Korean troop movements, and the administration said Washington was doing so now to convey the seriousness with which it views the matter.

“We recognize the potential danger here,” John Kirby, a spokesman for the National Security Council, told reporters at the White House. “And we’re going to be talking to allies and partners, including Ukrainians, about what the proper next steps are going to be.”

He emphasized repeatedly that the U.S. government does not yet know for certain that any North Korean soldiers will join the fighting in Ukraine, but he warned there would be consequences if they do.

“If these North Korean troops are employed against Ukraine,” Kirby said, “they will become legitimate military targets.”

That’s a simple statement of fact, but the obvious question becomes: “legitimate military targets” by whom? Representative Mike Turner (R-OH), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said yesterday the US should consider taking “direct military action” if North Korean troops enter the war in Ukraine.

Not just no, but Hell no!

I would not anticipate that, if the story details are accurate, that the troops are undergoing training at military bases in eastern Russia, those troops would enter the war before our election. With winter approaching, the ‘traditional’ seasons for ground troop warfare are ending. The распу́тица, the season of mud, can occur in Ukraine at any time in the autumn that heavy rains fall, to be followed by the hard freezes of winter. I feel confident that, if elected, Donald Trump would not be sending American troops to fight in Ukraine even if elements of the Korean People’s Army Ground Force did join the battle and move into Ukraine, but the possibility exists that Kamala Harris Emhoff will be the one taking that decision.

However, even if the chances that the United States would take “direct military action” are relatively low — though neocons like Bill Kristol, who wants to get the United States involved in every war that comes along, though he never chose to serve when he could have during the latter stages of the war in Vietnam, would push for it — there would be huge pressure on our European NATO allies to send troops to fight in Ukraine.

The Russo-Ukrainian War has mostly been a stalemate for the better part of two years, and I have said it before: Ukraine might be able to hold off the Russians for a while, but they cannot win their war and expel Russia from Ukraine without NATO troops on the ground in direct combat with Russia. If North Korean troops appear on the battlefield, it will be seen as legitimizing the introduction of NATO troops in Ukraine.

The war in Ukraine has largely faded in the American conscience, with the real military debate being about the war between Israel and the Islamist terrorists of Hamas and Hezbollah, and the possibility of expansion of that war to Iran. But the war in Ukraine is the one in which the enemy has nuclear weapons, and any move of NATO troops into Ukraine to defend against the Russians, and perhaps North Koreans, brings with it the possibility of Vladimir Putin ordering the use of ‘tactical’ nukes against NATO troop concentrations and supply bases.

This is a very bad thing.
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Also posted on American Free News Network. Check out American Free News Network for more well written and well reasoned conservative commentary.

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Killadelphia: Gang-banger killed, two more gang-bangers arrested for it Not the worst result in the world

Two months ago, we noted the murder of Abdul Vicks, 25, a rapper going by the stage name of YBC Dul. Mr Vicks was a ringleader in a Philly gang calling themselves Young Bag Chasers, and I called it a “public service homicide,” because this gang was particularly violent.

Part of that public service was that the punks who targeted and shot Mr Vicks would themselves wind up off the streets, once the Philadelphia Police identified and arrested them: both killers and killed would be removed from society. And so arrests have finally been made:

Second teen arrested for killing West Philly rapper, gang member YBC Dul

Rashawn Williams, 18, has been charged with killing Abdul Vicks, aka YBC Dul.

by Ellie Rushing | Wednesday, October 23, 2024 | 9:46 AM EDT

An 18-year-old has been charged with fatally shooting a local rapper and West Philadelphia gang leader — the second teen in two months to face charges in the high-profile killing.

Rashawn Williams, 18, was arrested Tuesday and charged with the murder of Abdul Vicks, the 25-year-old rapper affiliated with the West Philadelphia-based gang the Young Bag Chasers, or YBC.

Vicks, also known as YBC Dul or “Mr. Disrespectful,” was shot multiple times in a drive-by-style shooting in Olney on Aug. 23. Vicks had just picked up a friend, and was driving down the 100 block of West Olney Avenue when a white car pulled up alongside him at a stoplight. At least two people fired multiple shots into Vicks’ car, before speeding off, police said.

Vicks was struck multiple times in the chest and hand. In a panic, his friend drove back to his house on North Sixth Street, and then, with the help of his uncle, rushed Vicks to Einstein Medical Center, where he died just before 4 p.m.

16-year-old Aiden Waters had been arrested for the same crime in early September. Messrs Williams and Waters were both members of “Fastbreak, a previously little-known gang affiliated with the area around Fourth Street, Nedro Avenue, and Spencer Street in Olney.”

In our previous article on the subject, we noted the violence of Mr Vicks’ gang. The Philadelphia Inquirer described Mr Water’ (alleged) activities:

This dude is just 16! With any luck, the two (alleged) shooters hadn’t knocked up anyone, and will be locked up long enough that they will have Darwin Awarded themselves.

Gang-bangers killing other gang-bangers isn’t really that bad a thing. The biggest problem is that they are so often such rotten shots that they kill or wound innocent bystanders.

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Another one bites the dust!

We now have another reason why Hezbollah’s Deputy Secretary-General, Naim Qassem, fled Lebanon on the orders of his bosses in Iran. Just days after Hezbollah’s fearless leader, Hassan Nazrallah was sent to Jahannam, the late Mr Nasrallah’s cousin, Hashem Safieddine, seen as his likely successor, also went to see his 72 bacha bazi boys. From The New York Times:

The late Hashem Safieddine.

Israeli Military Says It Killed Top Hezbollah Leader

Hashem Safieddine was widely seen as a potential successor to his cousin, Hassan Nasrallah, the armed group’s former leader whom Israel also killed in September. There was no immediate confirmation from Hezbollah.

Tuesday, October 22, 2024 | Updated: Wednesday, October 23, 2024 | 3:58 AM EDT

Israel’s military said on Tuesday that it had killed Hashem Safieddine, the presumed successor to Hezbollah’s recently slain leader, in an airstrike near Beirut, Lebanon, in early October.

The airstrike had targeted a meeting of senior Hezbollah leaders. It was one of the heaviest bombardments to hit the area known as the Dahiya since an Israeli assault killed Hezbollah’s longtime leader, Hassan Nasrallah, on Sept. 27.

Perhaps “meeting(s) of senior Hezbollah leaders” aren’t the safest places to be. I suppose that Mr Safieddine didn’t have his pager with him.

CNN has a list of Hezbollah’s top leaders, and how many of them became former leaders.

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Another #Hezbollah leader goes into exile Have governments-in-exile ever achieved liberation for their countries?

My good friend William Teach of The Pirate’s Cove reported that, now that Yahya Sinwar has been sent to his 72 bacha bazi boys in Jahannam, the so-called ‘Palestinian Authority’ in Judea and Samaria are calling for a ceasefire. No Westerner can truly comprehend what passes for ‘thinking’ among the Arabs, but at least to me, it sounds as though the ‘Authority’ are worried that, now that Mr Sinwar is dead, the Israel Defense Force might turn more of its attention to the West Bank. I’d say that the IDF has more work to do in Gaza and the Hezbollah-controlled areas of southern Lebanon first.

We noted on Saturday that Mr Sinwar’s top surviving deputy, Khalil al-Hayya, has vowed that Hamas will continue the fight, but also noted that Mr al-Hayya lives comfortably in exile in Doha, Qatar, where many of the wealthy Hamas leaders stayed. Mr Sinwar, at least, had remained in Gaza, to ‘lead’ his Hamas followers in their war against Israel.

Which leads me to this article from The Jerusalem Post:

Fearing an Israeli targeted strike, Hezbollah’s new chief relocates to Tehran – report

Qassem left Beirut for Tehran on October 5, accompanied by Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.

By WALLA! | Sunday, October 20, 2024

Also read: The Jerusalem Post, “‘We were completely at Hezbollah’s mercy,’ former UN peace-keeper says: UNIFIL forces were heavily restricted by Hezbollah, and little was done when they reported violations of UN Security Council Resolution 1701.“

Hezbollah’s Deputy Secretary-General, Naim Qassem, has relocated from Lebanon to Iran out of fear that Israel may attempt to assassinate him, according to a Sunday report by the Emirati website Aram News, citing an Iranian source.

The Iranian source claimed, according to the website, that Qassem, who is considered the de facto leader of Hezbollah since the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah, has been in Tehran since October 5.

The source added that Qassem left Beirut that same day on an Iranian plane, accompanied by Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, to Damascus, and from there, he continued to Tehran.

The report continued to note that Sheikh Qassem’s second speech was recorded in his new residence in Tehran, and the move to Iran was ordered by senior officials in the Iranian government. But, as we have previously noted, Ismail Haniyeh found out that being safely ensconced in Tehran isn’t necessarily as safe as hoped.

The Palestinian Chronicle reported, in a biography of Sheikh Qassem, that he studied Islam under Shi’ite scholars, so that would make him appeal even more to Iran’s religious overseers. ‘Governments in exile’ are formed by governments and ‘leaders’ who have been defeated in their home countries. Poland’s leaders fled first to Paris following the Nazis’ September 1939 invasion, and later to London, after the Third Reich turned West and quickly defeated France. General Charles de Gaulle formed a French government-in-exile in London after France surrendered in June of 1940. These governments in exile exerted some small influence, but they never actually won the liberation of their countries; that was accomplished by other, foreign powers.

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Hamas say they won’t give up, even with Yahya Sinwar in Hell

At what point in history did the losers in a war ever get to dictate terms to the winners?

All kinds of people were sagely telling the world that, with the express train that sent Hamas’ leader, Yahya Sinwar, to his 72 bacha bazi boys in Jahannam, there was a fresh opportunity for a ceasefire to be negotiated. But the next dead man walking says no. From The New York Times:

Hamas Says Its Demands Are Unchanged as Biden Pushes for Gaza Cease-Fire

A top deputy to the killed Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar vowed that his “banner will not fall” and that the group would hold to its cease-fire conditions.

By Liam Stack, Aaron Boxerman, Bilal Shbair, and Jim Tankersley

Khalil al-Hayya.

A top Hamas official vowed on Friday that the killing of the group’s leader, Yahya Sinwar, would change nothing for its war with Israel, saying that it would fight on even as President Biden pressed for a deal to stop the conflict in the Gaza Strip and free the remaining hostages there.

In Hamas’s first official comments since Israel announced Mr. Sinwar’s death on Thursday, his deputy, Khalil al-Hayya, said that the group maintained its conditions for a cease-fire. He said Hamas still insisted on an end to Israel’s onslaught in Gaza, as well as its complete withdrawal from the territory and the release of Palestinian prisoners in Israel.

“We are continuing Hamas’s path,” Mr. al-Hayya, who lives in exile in Qatar, said in televised remarks in which he praised Mr. Sinwar for dying on the battlefield and added that his “banner will not fall.” It remained unclear when Hamas would announce a successor to Mr. Sinwar, who was fatally shot by Israeli soldiers in southern Gaza on Wednesday.

Mr. Sinwar orchestrated the Hamas assault on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, during which about 1,200 people were killed and another 250 were taken to Gaza as hostages. The assault led to Israel’s ongoing military campaign in Gaza, which has killed 42,000 people, according to local health officials, and left much of the territory in ruins.

Mr al-Hayya continued to say that there would be no release of the 101 hostages being held by Hamas until their demands are met. Of course, as the Times noted, Mr al-Hayya lives comfortably in exile in Doha, Qatar, where many of the wealthy Hamas leaders stayed. He’s far less vulnerable to Israeli attack, but, as Ismail Haniyeh and Hassan Nasrallah learned the hard way, living outside of the ‘Palestinian’ areas does not guarantee that your health won’t take a very quick turn for the worse.

There is continual political pressure on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to cut a deal that gets the hostages released, but that’s a poor idea. In 2011, Israel traded 1,027 Palestinian prisoners, one of whom was Mr Sinwar, for the release of one captured Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, and look how that turned out. It’s cold-hearted to say, but the 101 hostages, perhaps a third of whom are believed to already be dead, need to be considered casualties of the war, and lost forever. If, by chance, there are a few left alive and they are somehow rescued, great, but no ‘Palestinian’ prisoners — Mr Sinwar was in prison for killing four ‘Palestinians’ in Khan Younis — should ever be released.

The hostages are the only point of strength Hamas have; if Mr Netanyahu and the Israeli government take the hard decision to regard themas casualties, Hamas will have nothing left.

Mr Sinwar’s body will probably be given a Muslim burial in a secret place in Israel, to prevent it from becoming some sort of sick shrine for the ‘Palestinian’ irredentists to visit.