I try to write think pieces, things I’ve mulled over at length, rather than commentary on events as they are happening. But this afternoon (Oct. 7), as I contemplate the news from Israel, I’m too angry and heartbroken to retreat into reflection. The outrageous — no, that’s not strong enough — the utterly cowardly and contemptible Hamas attacks on innocent Israelis — the rocket attacks, the house-to-house massacres and rapes, the kidnappings — this is depravity, plain and simple. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has told his nation that this is war, and we can expect that the Israelis, once they recover from the shock and surprise of this morning’s attacks, will mete out a response animated by a righteous and entirely justified anger.
Hamas is the bad actor here, Palestinians who support Hamas are bad actors, and Iran is the worst actor of all.
Condemnation of the attacks has come from virtually every Western leader, including President Biden. One may note that Biden took his time, and that an earlier — and quickly deleted — post on “X” from the U.S. Office of Palestinian Affairs called on “all sides” to “refrain from violence and retaliatory attacks.” Since Israel had been the party attacked, the call to refrain from retaliation could only have been aimed at Israel. Deleted or not, an administration that tolerates this kind of thinking should be ashamed of itself, and a thoroughgoing house cleaning at this Office should proceed forthwith. We might go further and simply ask ourselves why we even need such an office. In this hour, what we need instead is to make it clear that the only Palestinian affairs that interest us are an end to Hamas and all its works, and a clean and total break between decent Palestinians and the monsters whose pretense it is to act on their behalf. (READ MORE from James H. McGee: Learn of Heroes at a Young Age)
Behind all this lurks the Iranian regime, the chief supporter of Hamas and, almost assuredly, the behind-the-scenes instigator of this morning’s attacks. These were carefully planned and orchestrated with precision, and the fingerprints of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard are likely all over them. In the days ahead, as the Israeli Defense Forces undertake to eject Hamas fighters from southern Israel and then to clean out the bases from which the attacks were launched, we should be prepared for a multi-front escalation.
In particular, we should be concerned that Hezbollah will launch attacks on Israel’s northern border, confronting the IDF with a two-front war. We should be further prepared for further “pot stirring” on other fronts, such as attacks on shipping in the Persian Gulf, or Iranian-sponsored terrorist attacks even further afield. In the last few years, Iran has cultivated close ties with the regime in Venezuela. At a time when the Biden administration has welcomed something akin to half a million Venezuelan refugees — while deporting only a relative handful — how can we be sure that the flood of refugees hasn’t included some hostile agents?
Regardless of the possibility of attacks against the U.S. homeland, if history teaches us anything at all, it offers repeated instruction in how conflict in the Middle East carries the potential for dramatic escalation. We should be deeply concerned, and we should be prepared for a broad range of eventualities. But what we emphatically should not do is reward Iran and its proxies by exerting our leverage with Israel to inhibit an effective Israeli response to the Hamas attacks. On the contrary. If ever there was a time to demonstrate iron resolve, that time is now.
Some will argue that supporting Israel risks our relationship with Saudi Arabia, or Egypt, or the Gulf States, or others in the Arab world. That position, in my view, is deeply wrongheaded. The Saudis may have opened diplomatic discussions recently with Iran, but those may quite rightly be viewed as a means of signalling displeasure with the Biden administration as it cozies up to Iran. The differences between Iran and Saudi Arabia are fundamental, and no amount of Saudi triangulation suggests otherwise.
The Biden administration’s misguided efforts to revive the Iran nuclear deal, to undermine the Abraham Accords, and to offer ridiculous financial rewards for prisoner exchanges have emboldened Iran. While it would be unfair to hold the administration responsible for inviting the current attacks on Israel, nothing we’ve done in the last several years has suggested that Iran or its proxies might pay a price with us for such monstrosities. And it’s still not at all clear that we will offer anything more than words in the present situation. We can’t recover the $6 billion we recently gave Iran, but we can impose fresh sanctions, and encourage others to follow our lead. (READ MORE: Abraham Accords Set to Endure Despite Biden)
For starters, however, we can make our condemnation clear, and, above all, we can sustain our condemnation of Hamas and our support for Israel even as the IDF goes about destroying the ability of Hamas to ever again wage such attacks. If now is the time for reckoning, then we don’t need a team of nuclear deal negotiators compromised by close ties to the Iranian regime; that mess needs to be cleaned up, no matter how embarrassing for the current administration or its Democrat predecessors. We now are seeing that Robert Malley, both Obama’s and Biden ‘s point man on Iran negotiations, was not only a proponent of friendship with Hamas, but also the conduit through which Iranian agents were introduced into sensitive national security positions
Nor do we need the chirping of “Squad” members about moral equivalence, or the antisemitic rantings of many leftist academics and their followers. Frankly, we’d be best served if the Omar’s and Tlaib’s would, for once, hold their tongues, and if they insist on speaking up, perhaps, for once, our President might simply invite them to shut up. Hamas is the bad actor here, Palestinians who support Hamas are bad actors, and Iran is the worst actor of all. We are now paying a price for our lame response to a decade of protests against the Iranian regime, and our unwillingness to hold that regime accountable.
In a recent The American Spectator article, I wrote: “George Orwell reputedly observed that ‘people sleep peacefully at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.’ If the quotation isn’t precise, then the sentiment absolutely is. But the reverse is equally true. The need for good and decent people to sleep peacefully at night justifies the actions of rough men on their behalf. It may be the only true justification for those actions.”
In the days to come, as the rough men and women of the IDF go forth to enable good and decent Israelis to sleep peacefully once again, let’s not get caught up in the notion that “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter,” or any other such silliness. Hamas has committed an act of unspeakable terrorism, and in doing so, it has undermined any legitimate Palestinian aspirations. Instead, it has only served a vile antisemitism rooted in the days of the Hitler’s good friend, Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, and the equally vile antisemitism of the Iranian regime.
Tonight, if we do nothing else, we should at least take the time to say a prayer for the Israelis slaughtered today and for their grieving families. And then we should give our loved ones a hug and thank God that we can sleep safe tonight.
James H. McGee retired in 2018 after nearly four decades as a national security and counter-terrorism professional, working primarily in the nuclear security field. Since retiring he’s begun as second career as a thriller writer. His 2022 novel, Letter of Reprisal, tells the tale of a desperate mission to destroy a Chinese bioweapon facility hidden in the heart of the central African conflict region.
