The Warsaw Uprising didn’t kill 1,200 German civilians, you antisemitic troglodyte.

On October 7th the world changed, and I will never be able to look at it as I would have on October 6th ever again. Yet, despite it all, I know and find solace: Am Yisrael Chai.

I would have thought unbelievable the very idea that those who committed the atrocities of the day would be so driven by hate they would sacrifice even their own people simply to weaponise that and its impossible choices against Jews.

I couldn't have accepted that, after the single deadliest day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust, Israelis and Jews around the world would go on to bear so much more hate, persecution, and violence from so many and for so long.

I would have pleaded surely not had I been told that, later that very same day, there would be people justifying the attacks, celebrating the attacks, chanting to "globalise the intifada" and more - and that these people would be marching on the streets still three years later.

I didn't know that in the days after I would have nightmares driven by what I was yet to learn, my own brain torturing me with what-ifs had my own most loved one, a Jewish woman who shines more brightly than the stars, been there.

I would not want to believe just how many people would be stolen from their homes and families, living and dead, and suffer weeks, months, years in the hands of a so-called "resistance" dedicated only to plumbing the depths of human depravity.

I could not have known in those early moments the horrific scale of the attacks, how so many would be murdered. I would not have even wanted to be able to imagine the barbarity and unspeakable evil Hamas would inflict on men, women, and even children.

A thread of reflection I remember on October 7th seeing the first news reports coming through and feeling grief. But I could not have known in those first moments just how much worse it would turn out to be than I could have even imagined, both on that dark day itself and after.

When I remember October 7 as a Jew, I feel a sorrow that reminds me I am not alone. Our people grieve together with a collective consciousness. We mourn the innocent lives senselessly taken, comfort their surviving friends and families, and keep their memories alive. In the face of the third anniversary of this tragedy, I remember the lost, I honor those who recovered the stolen, and we stay strong together. Am Yisrael Chai. Simon Vigdergauz, 21: An Ukrainian immigrant who planned to go to medical school, Simon and his girlfriend, Rita, were found near Sderot where they were believed to have been killed. He met Rita while serving in the IDF in the Yamas covert counter-terrorism unit. He was instantly besotted when he learned Rita also wanted to go to medical school, and spent all of their time together. Niv Raviv, 27 and Nirel Zini, 31: Murdered in their home in Kibbutz Kfar Aza, Nirel and Niv had planned to get engaged three days later on October 10, the eighth anniversary of Nirel's miraculous survival of an ambush. Their families did not know their fate for over a week. The couple had planned to live a simple life on the kibbutz where they volunteered and donated to various humanitarian causes. Amit Mann, 22: A Magen David Adom paramedic at Kibbutz Be'eri, she sacrificed her life to set up a hospital for the wounded. She continue caring for her patients for hours before terrorists succeeded in breaking in and murdering her. Her haunting calls to the police asking for rescue, and her last words to her sister as she was shot while still on the call, are one of the many terrifying recordings from that day. Oded Lifshitz, 83: A retired journalist, Oded was one of the founding members of Kibbutz Nir Oz. He was kidnapped to Gaza by Palestinian Islamic Jihad along with his wife, Yocheved Lifshitz, who was one of the first to released from captivity. For nearly two nears, Oded's family had no idea what had happened to him. His body was returned to Israel in February 2025. He was slain in captivity and not held with his wife, whom he never saw again after that terrible day. As a peace activist, he fought for the rights of Bedouins and other Arab minorities in Israel. Together with Yocheved, Oded volunteered to drive Gazans to Israeli hospitals for medical care. These are just five of the dead, but all of their stories are worth knowing. So many showed so much courage and strength in their lives and final moments. May their memories always be a blessing.

Quiz time! The IRGC was finally proscribed, and police forces finally declared they would arrest people for chanting to "globalise the intifada", and reviews into NHS and education system antisemitism were launched, under which Prime Minister? A: Rishi Sunak B: Keir Starmer

Fuck Hamas.

Three years after the catastrophic day Hamas unleashed on Israelis and on the Palestinian people in Gaza, the majority of the “pro-Palestine” industrial complex still refuses to utter a single word of condemnation or assign any responsibility to the Islamist terror group that destroyed the Gaza Strip and triggered the most calamitous chapter in modern Palestinian history. Today alone, I have seen dozens of posters and announcements for rallies, protests, and a so-called “week of rage.” Endless groups across the Western world, including the United States, whether community-based, campus-based, nonprofit, or cultural, are celebrating and commemorating “three years of resistance and genocide.” In almost comical language, many declare October 7 as the beginning of genocide in Gaza while making no mention of the bloodshed, murder, beheadings, torture, mutilation, burning people alive, executions, sexual assault, and hostage taking that initiated the disaster which befell the Palestinian people. It is as if Israeli and Jewish lives are invisible. As if civilians were not slaughtered in their homes while they slept. As if partygoers were not massacred. As if the attack was not entirely unprovoked while a ceasefire was in place between Israel and Hamas. It is a complete erasure of cause and effect and a refusal to grasp that choices and actions produce consequences. I have yet to see a mainstream Arab, Palestinian, or Muslim American organization, let alone prominent “pro-Palestine” academics, journalists, community groups, or notable individuals, issue a statement acknowledging Hamas’s responsibility and culpability for the devastation inflicted on Gaza. Even within the imbalance of power and the overwhelming suffering caused by Israeli decisions, there is still ample space to acknowledge the humanity of Israeli victims and the injustice of what happened to them. More importantly, there is immense space to speak honestly about the horrendous damage caused to Palestinians by the Jihadi fascism of Hamas, which has devastated Gazans over the two decades of its rule. Three years later, Israelis, Jews, and Zionists are commemorating the anniversary while engaging in introspection, critique, and calls for accountability for leaders, security services, and other political players. In contrast, instead of using the grim third anniversary of October 7 to learn and evolve, significant elements of the “pro-Palestine” industrial complex remain one of the most embarrassing and backward hate-driven movements in contemporary political activism. This is not a real pro-Palestine movement. It is a virulent anti-Israel bloc built on ignorance, mob mentality, open sympathy for terrorism, and sabotage of the Palestinian people’s legitimate pursuit of freedom and prosperity. Its regressive and poisonous rhetoric will not evolve into anything constructive. It should be treated with contempt, stripped of relevance, and isolated until it collapses and makes room for a serious effort that actually cares about Palestinians rather than the fantasies of wannabe revolutionaries.

A Statement of Conscience on October 7 I will not start by saying ‘as a Muslim’ or ‘as an imam’, but as a human being. On October 7, over 1,200 innocent people were killed in a single day. Families were shot in their homes. Young people out dancing were hunted across open fields. Over 250 people, including children and the elderly, were dragged into Gaza as hostages. I think of a mother hiding in a safe room with her baby’s mouth covered. I think of a father listening as the line went quiet. I think of families who waited month after month for someone to come home, only to receive a coffin. I didn’t need my faith to recognize the evil of what happened. My heart told me first. But I’m a Muslim and an imam, and I owe the world one honest sentence: what was done that day was a crime against God. God teaches that whoever kills one innocent soul, it is as if he had killed all humanity. This day has an author: Yahya Sinwar. He planned it, ordered it, and knew what would follow. Every death of that day and war he started rests on him and Hamas leaders who sat in tunnels and foreign hotels and called slaughter a victory. It rests on every Palestinian leader who cheered, excused, handed out sweets, or said nothing. They chose this. They own it. But Sinwar did not invent himself. He was the fruit of a tree planted almost a century ago by the Muslim Brotherhood. Hamas named itself in its founding charter as the Brotherhood’s branch in Palestine. The Brotherhood’s poison is slow. It arrives through study circles, youth camps, charity boxes, and kind words to lonely young men. Drop by drop, it teaches him that his religion is a political party, his neighbour is his enemy, the Jew is the cause of his sorrow, and God is pleased by rage. By the time the gun arrives, the soul is already taken. I have seen this poison in mosques where sermons became rallies and young men could recite slogans but not sit still for a verse on mercy. Every people that let the Brotherhood in has paid in blood and ruined generations. It has never built anything it did not first set on fire. Behind Hamas stands another hand: the IRGC. It was the IRGC’s money, weapons, and training that turned a hateful idea into an army. One calls itself Sunni and the other Shia, and they may curse each other’s creeds, but they are united in what they worship. It is not God. It is power. The same IRGC that armed the killers of October 7 shoots Iranian girls for showing their hair, hangs young men for asking to be free, and has left graves from Tehran to Damascus to Beirut. They speak in God’s name. So did Pharaoh speak in the name of heaven. So let me say this clearly. Hamas and the IRGC are not merely enemies of Islam. That would be too small a charge, as if their crime were only against us. They are enemies of God. God is the Giver of life, yet they deal in death. God calls Himself the Most Merciful, yet they have made cruelty a sacrament. God honoured the children of Adam, yet they look at a child and see a target or a shield. To murder what God created and sign His name to it is the oldest blasphemy. And we Muslims have been too quiet. Some of us were afraid. Some told ourselves it was not our business. Some, God forgive them, felt something other than horror that morning and never confessed it. Silence was the soil this poison grew in. I will not add to it. So on this anniversary, let us say plainly what our scripture already says. The Jews are not our enemies. They are our cousins in Abraham, and their dead were created by the same God who created us. Today belongs to them: the murdered, the hostages, and families who still set a place at the table. To them I say: I am sorry for what was done to you by men who used the words of my prayers. You’re not alone in your grief or remembrance. The enemies of God are those who murder in His name. We know their names. It is time we said them from our own pulpits, in our own voices, before they speak for us again. Imam Tawhidi

Memorials serve a specific function. Whether it's 9/11 or 10/7. The task is to honor the victims, survivors, families, and communities. When you use any of that to make a different point, you render what is meant to be memorialized into a mere "premise." This serves no one.

Even worse than Mamdani's You want to paint Gazan suffering in lurid detail, but victims of 7/10 are just "killed" or taken hostage Maybe a blessing in disguise, if you will leave those who suffered in peace, rather than their nightmares become part of your morbid fascinations

October 7 wasn't just an attack on the right to assemble. It was an attack on human joy. It was an attack on the cause of peace. It was a rejection of the Israeli state and those who dwell there.

I know antisemitism breaks many people's brains, but not usually quite this literally. You may need to add "medical" to the list of interventions needed for you, Mike.

Hold your Jewish and/or Israeli friends close today. #AmYisraelChai

Am Yisrael Chai.