DAY 38 OF THE GAZA WAR: IDF Exposes Hamas Use of Hospitals,Northern Border Slightly Quieter, Why did Anti Israel Become Antisemitic?

Tel Aviv Diary November 13, 2023

The first thing I do every morning when I wake up is remove the “Do Not Disturb” status from my iPhone. Then, I scroll through the notifications, hoping to find one stating we have rescued some of the hostages. Every morning so far, the rest of the country and I are disappointed. At least once a day, often more, I pass by the tables of the hostage families. It's hard to see them and try to imagine how they feel. Every day brings a new rumor, a new possibility of a deal, but to date, neither a deal nor a military rescue has materialized.

Today was another relatively quiet day. There was only one rocket barrage launched at the center of the country. Five rockets were fired; all were intercepted. There were also a few rockets fired at Israeli settlements on the Gaza border area. It's clear that Hamas is having a very difficult time firing the rockets they have left. It was reported that more rockets were fired at Israel from the North than from Gaza.

For the IDF, it was another day of clearing out portions of Northern Gaza. Israeli troops returned fire after Hamas terrorists fired an RPG at IDF forces — from inside Al Kuds hospital. The IDF killed 20 terrorists at the hospital. It was announced that we lost two soldiers yesterday.

We are probably a few days away from the IDF announcing it has completely captured the city of Gaza. The most interesting development of the last two days is that Hamas terrorists are beginning to surrender, instead of choosing to fight to the death. The fact that almost all the civilians in Gaza have ignored Hamas and headed South, combined with Hamas’s inability to impede the advance of Israeli armored forces in any way, has convinced many in Hamas that the situation for them is hopeless.

Channel 13 interviewed the commander of the IDF Armored Corps, whom I believe is a Druze. In the run-up to the interview, Raviv Drucker asked the commander if he planned to get even with all those who said the tank was obsolete, and that Israel does not need to buy any more. The commander laughed and said his job was to win the war, not settle scores. Interestingly, I have a friend and neighbor who once had that job (he is a man in his mid-80s today). I saw him yesterday, and the first words out of his mouth were, “The tank is back.”

The IDF took control of Gaza’s Rantasi Hospital and discovered a large quantity of armaments and a Hamas control center. The army worked with hospital administration to evacuate all the patients. The IDF found a Hamas tunnel with an entrance by the hospital; this tunnel is still being explored by robots

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The army believes that some of the hostages were held at the hospital for a some period of time. The IDF spokesman, who himself was once a commander, took foreign reporters into the hospital with him, where, beyond the cache of arms, they found diapers and other signs that children had been held in the basement of the hospital. Unfortunately, the hostages were moved before the IDF arrived. However, the pictures of the use of the hospital for weapon storage and for hiding hostages provide compelling evidence. Watch the video its worth the time

Another interesting point is that the IDF has placed cameras on the route South in Gaza, tied to facial recognition software, to ensure that no known terrorists or hostages try to move South

Golani Brigade Inside Gaza Parliament

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Israel is going to have to decide when to address the area of Gaza that it has not yet occupied in force. Continuing the meticulous methodology that has been used until now will take time. Even though the loss of every soldier is the death of an entire world, casualties have to date been much lower than anticipated. Still, almost all Israelis are firmly united in the twin goals of completing the mission, while doing everything to keep our casualty count as low as possible.

Foreign Minister, Eli Cohen, joined the line of ministers whose comments hurt us. In Cohen’s case, he stated we only have 2-3 weeks of legitimacy in the eyes of the world to continue vigorous military action in Gaza. Whether it's true or not, having the Foreign Minister make that statement publicly is yet another “self-goal”. Beyond public relations, I'm not sure how Cohen’s statement is relevant. We are not going to quit fighting Hamas because the world, or even the U.S. says we should stop. We will only stop after we have accomplished our goals.

Meanwhile, in Northern Israel, conditions seemed to have calmed down slightly. While there were a number of anti-tank missile attacks fired on settlements and soldiers, all the attacks today were limited to the area immediately surrounding the border — in contrast to yesterday, when the rockets fired reached much deeper into Israel.

There were reports that Hezbollah has been under pressure from within Lebanon to step back and not drag their country into a war. There has always been a question of how much Nasrallah and Hezbollah are fully under the control of Tehran. This may be a test of that exact question, as it would seem Tehran has been pushing for a greater confrontation; probably just short of a full-scale war.

I have had a hard time explaining why anti-Israel rhetoric has suddenly transformed into antisemitism. This shift did not begin when Israel retaliated against the Hamas massacre and the global community witnessed the impact of our counterattacks on Gaza. Instead, antisemitism surged immediately after the Hamas terrorists attacked Israel on October 7th.

An esteemed friend of mine, with a background in intelligence suggested a compelling explanation. He posits that on October 7th, for the first time in 70 years, Jews appeared vulnerable. This perceived vulnerability, he contends, made it acceptable to target Jews, allowing the latent antisemitism that had always been present to manifest openly, as it is now directed at what some perceive as “defenseless Jews”. It's just a theory, but an intriguing one.

The following is my weekly radio segment from today mostly on the war

BUSINESS

Azerbaijan has purchased the Israeli-made “Barak” anti-aircraft system from IAI, in a deal valued at $1.2 billion.  The understanding is Azerbaijan is worried about an attack from Iran.

Lunar.dev, an Israeli startup, raised $6 million in a seed round to develop a new standard in external API management in production. Led by Uncork Capital and Angular Ventures, the funding will enhance their platform minimize costs, and improve performance in API consumption. Lunar.dev, founded in 2022 by Eyal Solomon and Roee Gavai, specializes in efficient, real-time API management solutions. The investment will support team expansion and SaaS version development, alongside their involvement in national civic tech initiatives.