‘No thinking Jew could vote for Abdul El-Sayed,’ said one congregant at Michigan’s Temple Israel

Posted on September 22, 2026 by ArchitectGuy

FREE PRESS
They Were Lifelong Democrats. Then a Terrorist Attacked Their Synagogue.
Olivia Reingold
September 22, 2026

Elise Otis and Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed agree on just about everything, she said—from abortion rights to DEI to taxing the rich. There’s just one thing standing in the way of her casting a ballot for him: what Otis alleges is “his hatred of Jews.” “Everything else I 1,000 percent agree with,” said Otis, a 55-year-old Jew and lifelong Democrat. “But I can’t support someone I don’t think will keep my family safe.” Otis is one of more than a dozen members of Temple Israel, one of the largest Reform synagogues in the country, who told me they will not be voting for El-Sayed this November. The synagogue, which sits about 30 minutes outside of Detroit, has historically been home to a liberal congregation—performing gay commitment ceremonies as early as the ’90s—and a bastion of Democratic support. And yet, a member of the temple’s leadership said she expects about 70 percent of congregants to vote for El-Sayed’s Republican opponent Mike Rogers on November 3. READ MORE

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Israel Derangement Syndrome symptoms include hysteria, moral relativism and chronic misuse of the word ‘genocide’

Posted on September 22, 2026 by ArchitectGuy

WALL STREET JOURNAL
You May Have Israel Derangement Syndrome
Kyle Smith
September 21, 2026

The Israel Defense Forces may be the smartest and the most resourceful military on the face of the earth. Yet its most implacable foe is increasingly elusive, even as it spreads everywhere. It has already captured a gigantic prize: the minds of young people. New enlistees are eagerly signing up. What they’re pledging themselves to is IDS, or Israel Derangement Syndrome. When the subject turns to the Jewish state, formerly robust minds are turning to spoiled mayonnaise. Frontal autolobotomies are eagerly being carried out on every campus. IDS is a drug that gets you high on self-righteousness while disabling your cognitive faculties. This is your brain on IDS: Last week a major media outlet published a piece regarding Israel so devoid of all reason as to guarantee first-ballot entry to the Hall of Fame for Idiots. My first thought was to call 911 and report evidence of an adverse neurological event. READ MORE

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“I’m not sitting here in anger,” the conservative commentator and PragerU co-founder tells The Media Line as he reflects on paralysis, gratitude, memory, faith and the work he still intends to finish

Posted on September 19, 2026 by ArchitectGuy

MEDIA LINE
Grateful for His ‘Blessed Life,’ Dennis Prager Says ‘We Are Our Memories’
Felice Friedson
September 24, 2026

Dennis Prager has spent a lifetime explaining why people should be grateful. After a fall left him without the use of his arms or legs, the ideas he has taught for decades have now become the principles by which he confronts his own devastating situation…Today he talks about the gifts many people never notice: the ability to breathe, to speak and to think clearly. “Obviously, I can breathe, which is a miracle unto itself, and I can speak, though with somewhat of a gravelly voice, and those are two great gifts,” Prager said. “And my brain was not in any way affected.”…Since the accident on Nov. 12, 2024, which left him a quadriplegic, Prager has confronted losses that are intimate as well as immense….“I have prepared all of my life for the eventuality of tragedy,” he said. That sentence is neither resignation nor self-pity. It is the premise of a lifelong argument: that happiness is not dependent on escaping pain; that gratitude must survive disappointment; and that people may endure calamity without making calamity their identity. READ MORE

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EVENT: StandWithUs Midwest Annual Gala November 1, 2026

Posted on September 19, 2026 by ArchitectGuy

StandWithUs Midwest Gala 2026

Posted in Israel & Middle East | Leave a comment

Israeli filmmaker of ‘NAZA’ under scrutiny over longstanding ties to Hamas-linked activist

Posted on September 17, 2026 by ArchitectGuy

YESHIVA WORLD
BLOOD LIBEL: 2 Israeli Filmmakers Spark Wave Of Antisemitism; Israel Mulls Revoking Their Citizenship
September 14, 2026

The “NAZA” documentary by two Israeli filmmakers, Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, has stirred an international antisemitic uproar and reignited the wave of accusations against Israel and the IDF over the war in the Gaza Strip after winning the Jury Prize at the closing ceremony of the 83rd Venice Film Festival on the first day of Rosh Hashanah. “NAZA” is an acronym for the Hebrew words “נזק אגבי” – collateral damage. The documentary makes libelous accusations against Israel, claiming that the IDF deliberately calculated its strikes in Gaza during the war to kill as many civilians as possible using an AI-assisted tool called the “Lavender” system. One interviewee claimed that the IDF approved a strike that was estimated to kill 500 civilians, a claim the IDF firmly denies. The documentary, which was filmed on Tel Aviv rooftops during the war in Gaza, features [anonymous] interviews with what it claims are 24 IDF soldiers purportedly serving in Unit 8200. READ MORE

FREE PRESS Haviv Rettig Gur: Hold Your Applause for the New Gaza Documentary Start with the question of civilian casualties. The online conversation about the film—as distinct from the film’s own claims—is replete with shock and horror at the finding that the IDF calculated the estimated number of civilian deaths before each strike. According to the usual Israel critics, this shows that the resulting deaths amounted to deliberate murder. It’s almost impossible to overstate how clownishly (and intentionally) wrong this claim is. International humanitarian law requires those planning an attack to assess foreseeable civilian harm and take feasible precautions to avoid or minimize it. You can’t assess proportionality in relation to the expected military advantage of a strike—as required by law—without that calculation.

JPOST Israeli filmmaker of ‘NAZA’ under scrutiny over longstanding ties to Hamas-linked activist Israeli filmmaker Yuval Avraham has a longstanding relationship with Hamas-linked Palestinian journalist and activist Ahmed Alnaouq, investigative journalist Eitan Fischberger first reported Sunday…Culture and Sports Minister Miki Zohar said he would seek to revoke Abraham and Szor’s Israeli citizenship, accusing the filmmakers of committing an “act of treason against the state.”

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“Arms sales to Israel have repeatedly drawn objections from some members of Congress, who have argued that the administration has moved forward with major transfers while limiting the legislative branch’s ability to review them”

Posted on September 17, 2026 by ArchitectGuy

MILITARY.COM
Trump Administration’s $2.8 Billion Munitions Sale to Israel Includes 2,000-Pound Bombs
Adam Gramegna
September 16, 2026

The Trump administration is reportedly planning to sell Israel an approximate $2.8 billion munitions package including tens of thousands of 2,000-pound bombs. The package includes 20,000 MK 84 and 20,000 BLU-117 bomb bodies, according to an unnamed official who told Reuters on the condition of anonymity due to the sale not yet being made public. The Washington Post first reported the transaction…That package would add to a series of major U.S. arms sales to Israel under the Trump administration. In January, the administration approved sales worth $6.67 billion…The current administration lifted a hold that the Biden administration had placed on shipments of 2,000-pound bombs. The previous White House had paused these over concerns about civilian casualties in Gaza. READ MORE

THE HILL Top Democrat puts hold on Trump’s $2.8B weapons sale to Israel The top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee took the rare step Wednesday of publicly announcing a hold on the Trump administration’s $2.8 billion plan to sell 40,000 one-ton bombs to Israel. Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), the ranking member of the panel, said in a statement posted to X that he remains firmly committed to Israel’s security and its ability to defend itself, but raised concern about the risk to civilian lives, given the high death tolls throughout Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, and against Hezbollah in Lebanon. 

ALGEMEINER Vance Says US Policy Toward Middle East Can’t Be ‘Subservient’ to Israel US Vice President JD Vance said on Tuesday that the United States cannot allow its Middle East policy to become “subservient to the State of Israel,” arguing that American foreign policy should ultimately serve American interests…“Obviously Israel has been an important partner when it comes to military technology, when it comes to intelligence sharing, but also sometimes the United States doesn’t … agree with Israel.”…The comments were delivered against the backdrop of the Trump administration announcing a major new arms proposal with Israel. 

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“The Jewish billionaire made the call after the rapper’s accusations at a concert that Israel was committing genocide”

Posted on September 17, 2026 by ArchitectGuy

JTA
Robert Kraft pushes Ed Sheeran to drop Macklemore from tour following ‘Free Palestine’ controversy
Andrew Lapin
September 14, 2026

Robert Kraft, the Jewish and pro-Israel billionaire, took credit Monday for helping to pressure Ed Sheeran to drop pro-Palestinian rapper Macklemore from his tour. Kraft, who owns one of the stadiums where Macklemore was scheduled to perform, confirmed the rapper’s own account of the businessman’s involvement in a statement shared with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency “Gillette Stadium has a longstanding commitment to providing a welcoming environment for all guests and ensuring that events held at our venue do not provide a platform for hate speech,” Kraft said READ MORE

DAILY WIRE Every Band Touring With Ed Sheeran Just Rage Quit To Back Antisemite Ed Sheeran’s “The Loop” North American tour is facing further shake-ups as all his remaining support acts have quit in solidarity with rapper Macklemore.
Irish singer-songwriter Aaron Rowe was the first to exit, sharing his decision in an Instagram post on Tuesday — in which he echoed Macklemore’s call to “free Palestine” and invoked his Irish heritage as the reason he could not ignore “genocide” and “violent occupation” happening elsewhere.

ALGEMEINER After Ed Sheeran Tour Ouster, Macklemore Pledges $1 Million to Gaza Aid Groups With Terror Ties, Watchdog Says Macklemore has pledged $1 million from his earnings on Ed Sheeran’s tour to six aid groups supporting Palestinians, including three with Hamas and other terrorist ties, the Jerusalem-based watchdog NGO Monitor said Thursday, amid a public feud over the rapper’s ouster from the tour.

FREE PRESS Robert Kraft Made Macklemore a Martyr Kraft and his fellow team owners were well-intentioned, and perfectly entitled to ban a musician from the stadiums they privately own. But is the move really serving the fight against antisemitism? To many observers, it looks like Macklemore is being banned for his politics, rather than over bigotry—which makes Kraft and his fellow owners appear less than friendly to free speech…It doesn’t help that some of the owners have been perfectly willing to host another rapper, one with a much more disturbing history of Jew-hate. Kanye West has a track record of naked, straightforward antisemitism—lest we forget, he released a song that was literally called “Heil Hitler.”

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Report on NYT coverage concludes “coverage “assigns near-exclusive agency and responsibility to Israel while diminishing Hamas’s role in sustaining the conflict”

Posted on September 15, 2026 by ArchitectGuy

JPOST
‘NYT’ coverage framed Israel as ‘sole aggressor,’ Palestinians as ‘passive victims,’ study finds
Mathilda Heller
September 14, 2026

The New York Times’ reporting after October 7 consistently portrayed Palestinians as “passive victims” and Israel as the “sole aggressor,” a new peer-reviewed study by Edieal Pinker of Yale School of Management found. The study, How The New York Times Framed the War Between Israel and Hamas, was published in the academic journal Studies in Conflict & Terrorism last week. It is an expansion of an initial quantitative study published by Pinker in February 2025, as covered by The Jerusalem Post at the time. Drawing on a body of 1,559 news articles written between October 7, 2023, and 7 June, 2024, Pinker documents a dominant narrative that assigned “near-exclusive agency and responsibility to Israel while diminishing Hamas’s role in sustaining the conflict.”  According to Pinker, in this narrative, from October 8, 2023, onward, Israel “has been the sole aggressor” whereas Palestinians are portrayed as “passive victims whose suffering grows daily as they are relentlessly attacked by the Israeli military.” READ MORE

PITTSBURGH JEWISH CHRONICLE New York Times walks back line that seemed to question if Israelis were victims on Oct. 7 In an article on the documentary film “NAZA” published Monday, the newspaper reported, “Israelis are deeply divided over how to apportion blame for the policy, military and intelligence failures that preceded the attack and the war.” “But Israelis still largely view themselves as the victims of Oct. 7,” the report said. The statement drew fire from critics, who said the line cast doubt on whether Israelis were victims of the attack. “Implying Israelis falsely view themselves as victims while downplaying Oct. 7 ignores basic reality,” says CAMERA, a media watchdog group. “Intelligence failures don’t negate civilian suffering. True journalistic integrity requires context and facts, not narrative spin.”

CAMERA Tamar Sternthal: NY Times Publishes Editor’s Note After Reporting Israelis ‘Largely View Themselves’ As Oct. 7 Victims CAMERA today prompted a social media uproar and an Editor’s Note at The New York Times after the Gray Lady reported that “Israelis still largely view themselves as the victims of Oct. 7,” wording which suggests that Israelis were not, in fact, the victims of Hamas’ horrific Oct. 7, 2023 massacre. 

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In its latest edition, ‘The Economist’ presented Islamism and the European far right as two symmetrical threats. They are not.

Posted on September 14, 2026 by ArchitectGuy

FREE PRESS
The Lie About Islam, Europe, and the Dangers We Face
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
September 15, 2026

…The Economist’s own reporters record that counter-extremism researchers estimate about one British Muslim in five to hold Islamist sympathies. As mentioned, British Muslims are 6.5 percent of the population of England and Wales. One in five of that share is approximately 1.3 percent of the general public, that is, some 775,000 people. The Economist editorial was titled “The Good News: Few Muslims Want to Subvert European Democracy.” I do not know what the word “few” means in the editorial vocabulary of this magazine, but it does not, in ordinary English, mean 775,000. If another poll commissioned by The Economist had found that 775,000 members of any other identifiable British community were committed to imposing a legal order incompatible with liberal democracy, that finding would not have been casually labeled “good news.” READ MORE

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The filmmakers mistook the IDF’s system for limiting civilian casualties for something far darker. They should have asked me; I helped build it.

Posted on September 14, 2026 by ArchitectGuy

TIMES OF ISRAEL
What ‘Naza’ really means: The truth about collateral damage
Sarit Zehavi
September 17, 2026

The creators of the recent documentary, “NAZA,” about “Naza” (a Hebrew military acronym for Nezek Agavi – collateral damage) did not have to work too hard to discover the truth. They could have simply interviewed me. I would have stood in front of the camera, without hiding my identity, on the roof of my house nine kilometers (5.6 miles) from Lebanon, where we endured endless barrages of rockets, and explained the reality on the ground. A little less than 20 years ago, I was one of the founders of the unit within the IDF that deals with warning populations on the other side of enemy lines and preserving civilian lives. We built the processes that define how to issue evacuation warnings, and how to track evacuations. I was personally involved in formulating target approval processes and operational discussions. READ MORE

CAMERA Why did the crowd applaud ‘Naza” at the Venice Film Festival ? What exactly was the audience applauding when the screening of “Naza“ ended at the Venice Film Festival? What was it? The war? The addition of yet more false material intended to constrain Israel’s ability to defend itself? The sorry spectacle of two Jews debasing themselves as an offering to prejudice?…They were applauding out of fear. Fear of ostracism, of cancellation, of the social, artistic, and moral gulag…The crowd kept applauding because not to do so would have meant appearing to support the alleged genocide. What they truly feared, she argued, was social death, inevitably followed by professional death—one of the harshest punishments a modern Western society can impose on people who have committed no crime but crossed a social boundary.

JPOST Micha Danzig:c‘NAZA’ documentary can’t explain why a military bent on genocide would need AI Set the factual dispute aside and examine only the logic the film asks its audience to accept, because that logic collapses before any fact gets checked: If the goal was “genocide,” actual mass killing of a civilian population as such, why would anyone build an AI targeting system to do it? Genocide does not require precision. It requires the opposite. A military bent on erasing a population does not build software to identify individual operatives inside specific apartments. It carpet bombs the map, since dumb bombs kill more people faster and cheaper than any precision system devised.

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