With caution born of experience, the massive IDF formations are advancing inside Gaza City. A field officer familiar with the operations tells this account. He and Hamas both know that the coming battle, literally weeks away, will be decisive. It will determine whether this two-year war is remembered as a crushing Israeli victory or as one that leaves the terrorist organization standing on its feet. That is the battle being waged.
But the IDF is advancing with extreme care to protect both soldiers and hostages. The operational slowness, together with Israel's explanatory failure, is exacting a terrible price. The two years since the October 7 attacks, combined with the sophisticated propaganda apparatus of Hamas, its Qatari backers and their supporters in global media, social networks, the UN and academia, have persuaded leaders who had been on our side. For example, Italy's Giorgia Meloni. As a result we have reached a point where these are not only hypocritical European statements, but actions that seriously harm Israel's interests.
While most of the recent media attention has focused on Western "recognitions" of a Palestinian "state," the more worrying move is the one the European Union is planning. EU president Ursula von der Leyen, who throughout her term has generally shown a friendly line toward Israel, is now leading the imposition of sanctions that would chip away at trade agreements between Israel and the EU.
It should be remembered that the European Union is Israel's largest and closest trading partner. Between one-quarter and one-fifth of Israeli imports and exports are with Europe. In addition there are scientific and technological collaborations amounting to billions of euros. So economic sanctions, even modest ones, are no longer an empty rebuke but a bite into living flesh.
And of course the recognition initiative for "Palestine" set in motion by French president Emmanuel Macron complicates the picture. A state will not be born from this act alone. Yet if a Democratic president is elected in the US, he may align with the Europeans. Or, if and when negotiations with the "Palestinians" ever resume, the starting point will be weaker for us. Even if right-wing governments are elected in France, Britain, Canada and Australia in the coming years, Israel will still face a major diplomatic effort to roll back the tide of recognitions that swelled this past week.
Israel should not have reached this low point, and it could have been avoided. Indeed, great and powerful forces oppose us. But the Zionist approach has always been, as the old advertising line put it, "We Try Harder" — we make the greater effort. At home we stopped making that effort.
We have described in Israel Hayom, repeatedly over recent months, the explanatory failure that rests personally on the prime minister's shoulders. The drift of the past weeks, and the success of the "starvation in Gaza" campaign, are direct results of that failure. For reasons no one seems to understand, Netanyahu strangled the Israeli public diplomacy apparatus. Even last week, when a government proposal was raised to amend this, Netanyahu torpedoed it because of some quarrel with Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar. This is not how you build an explanatory effort.
Yes, there is antisemitism in the world and a loud, extreme left and hostile Muslim communities, and we already mentioned the media. Still, if two years after Hamas carried out genocide and war crimes against Israel it can turn the narrative worldwide and present us as the ones committing genocide, the implication is that we did not do our job properly. This failure is man-made, not the work of a higher power.
Of course this does not absolve the Europeans and others. As 90 years ago, they are again on the wrong side of history. Then they appeased the Nazi aggressor. Today they flatter militant Islam that threatens them from within, and on the way sacrifice the Jews. The only difference this time is that the Jews have a state and a great deal of power. "Israel will not be Czechoslovakia," as Ariel Sharon once said.
The Europeans, however, are already paying the price of their weakness and hypocrisy. Russian aggressiveness does not let the weakness emanating from European capitals go unnoticed. Putin is widening the bounds of provocation against his western neighbors, whether by "drone incursions" or by disrupting flights of senior European figures. It is astonishing and sad how history repeats itself.
Still, their failure does not solve our problems. Netanyahu will present his rhetorical response to the recognition of a Palestinian "state" on Friday, at the UN. The practical response, which those close to him see as more important, is supposed to be finalized with Trump at their meeting on Monday. The president remains a rock on our right. "I am on Israel's side. I have been on Israel's side all my life," he said bluntly and firmly during the holiday, with Emmanuel Macron sitting beside him. Let us hope he, at least, is not lost to us.
The loud minority
Boys in conspicuous kippot and swinging tzitzit walked along 181st Street. They looked somewhat out of place in the poor neighborhood north of Manhattan. Along the way they passed among crowds of Black and Hispanic residents and people whom fate had not favored. This is not American glamour but the poverty of Washington Heights, spread across makeshift sales stalls on plastic tables along the boulevard.
And yet in the middle of the neighborhood sits a compact brown-campus complex that houses one of the most successful institutions American Jewry has produced, Yeshiva University, or YU. It was no accident that its students bore such visible Jewish symbols. That is what their president, Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman, teaches them.
"People show respect for Judaism when they see Jews wearing their Torah, and proud of their Torah. They really come closer and respect that. My message is be proud of who you are and that you are Jewish. We do not hide who we are. We go out into the world."
We met in his office days before Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. Unlike the parallel institutions in the Reform and Conservative movements, which have had to close campuses because of falling enrollment, Yeshiva University is growing. True to its name, it combines yeshiva study with general education, training both rabbis and academics. Incidentally, the majority of its alumni and students over the years, roughly 60 percent by estimate, are not Jewish but Americans (and a handful of foreigners) who sought a high-quality university.
The figure most associated with Yeshiva University is probably Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, the unofficial leader of American Modern Orthodoxy in the last century. Indeed, this is an old institution that will mark 140 years since its founding in 2026.
Rabbi Dr. Berman, who took office in 2017, is only the fifth president in that long span. What distinguishes him from his predecessors is that he is the first Israeli to hold the position. He lived in Israel for a decade with his family, and his children serve in the IDF, including during the war. Last January Berman was among those who greeted President Donald Trump at the inauguration ceremony held in Congress. He was selected for the honor in connection with his previous activism against antisemitism. We met to talk about that.
At the outset Berman asks for perspective. He speaks of YU's famed basketball team, whose players enter the court wearing kippot, warm-up shirts bearing the hostages' images and who sing Hatikvah and the American national anthem. "What they do is sanctification of God. At one point the team won 50 consecutive games, the longest winning streak in college basketball. Everyone talked about the Jews winning at basketball."
According to him, both the media coverage of the team and crowd reactions in arenas have always been positive. So what about the problem of antisemitism? "It is focused on only seven campuses. That is 0.5 percent of all students in US universities. That's it. True, these are famous places and I do not claim we have no challenges. We do. But those places are not the core of America."
Religious studies
To bolster his argument, Berman points to the main forum in which he operates: the "religiously based universities," mostly Christian academies. Two million students study at these institutions, about ten percent of all US college students. After October 7 Berman led a joint declaration of one hundred such universities against terror, including Catholic and historically Black institutions.
"Religiously based universities are growing. They expand each year at a rate significantly above the average. If you want to know where America is and where it's heading — this says something. Americans are not seeking institutions that teach nothing, but an academy with values, meaning and purpose. These institutions are truly rooted in the foundations of Western civilization. You will not find antisemitism on their campuses. They are not seeking hatred. They are seeking light."
Those who follow deep trends in America understand what Berman means. At Charlie Kirk's memorial on Sunday, President Trump declared before 200,000 people in a stadium and millions of viewers at home, "We need to bring God back to America." Kirk himself promoted a Christian religious agenda.
Berman, as part of a broader trend in Orthodox American Jewry to join forces with Christians, sees an opportunity. He is careful to maintain theological separation. Still, there is a wide common ground.
He welcomes the administration's tough steps against antisemitism on campuses. "What President Trump is doing to hold institutions accountable for the antisemitism against their Jewish students is exactly what needs to be done for America. In other words, it is essential that universities be held responsible for crimes that occurred on their campuses."
But "that is only half the story." The other half is to show the good, focus on it and cultivate it. "If we need not only to fight antisemitism but also to radiate blessing, light, love, Torah and God's name outward, that is crucial. It is not only a struggle against evil, but adding good," he repeats. For Berman, a discourse that focuses only on antisemites and not on adding good is a victory for Israel's haters.
He does not keep his "not only a stick" approach within YU's walls. He recently told US Education Secretary Linda McMahon that "we should connect universities that are doing well and thereby show the way to others. I suggested creating a task force that will rate and reward institutions that do it right."
McMahon adopted the proposal and put Dr. Berman in charge of the task force. That means he is now in a position to influence the direction of US higher education.
We are sitting in your New York office. Is this your answer to the possibility that Amadani will be elected mayor?
"It is dangerous if Amadani is elected. It is bad for Israel, bad for the Jewish people, bad for New York and bad for the economy. But we have endured many mayors; we will endure Amadani too. If he is elected it will simply make our mission more urgent. If he spreads lies about Israel we will just educate more about Zionism, the blessing Israel represents to the world, and raise the Israeli flag higher."
I hear anxiety in the Jewish community in the city. People say that if Amadani is elected Jewish life in the city is finished and without a future, and perhaps worse.
"I do not believe that at all."
