![Israel must continue to be able to deter Hezbollah, Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar stressed on Wednesday, speaking amid efforts to reach a ceasefire with Iran's Lebanese terrorist proxy. "We need to keep the freedom to act if there will be violations. And we will have to act in time, before the problem will grow," the minister told a gathering of nearly 100 foreign ambassadors in Jerusalem, the Times of Israel reported. A deal to end more than a year of fighting on the northern border must be durable, Sa'ar said, saying Jerusalem “would like to reach an agreement that will stand the test of time." He added that a ceasefire would be an "opportunity" for Lebanon to regain its sovereignty after the Israeli military severely degraded the Iranian-backed group in recent months. He called for the Lebanese Armed Forces to be strengthened and urged the international community to invest more in the economically devastated country, which is drowning in debt following years of mismanagement and corruption. Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz also emphasized on Wednesday the necessity for Jerusalem to be able to act against any Hezbollah threats that may arise after a ceasefire deal is implemented. “The condition for any political settlement in Lebanon is the preservation of the intelligence capability and the preservation of the [IDF’s] right to act and protect the citizens of Israel from Hezbollah,” Katz said. Meanwhile, U.S. special envoy Amos Hochstein remained in Beirut for a second day on Wednesday to discuss "technical details" of an American ceasefire proposal with Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, who heads the Hezbollah-allied Amal movement. President Joe Biden's point man in the Land of the Cedars announced he would travel to Israel on Wednesday night, speaking after he made "additional progress" in a second meeting with Berri. Hochstein was scheduled to meet with Israeli Minister of Strategic Affairs Ron Dermer shortly after his arrival, followed by a tête-à-tête with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the following day. “The meeting today built on the meeting yesterday, and made additional progress,” Hochstein said. “So I will travel from here in a couple hours to Israel to try to bring this to a close if we can.” The Biden envoy added that he will work with the incoming Trump administration on ceasefire efforts, saying that he has kept the president-elect's transition team informed of progress. Hochstein described as "very productive" his meetings with Lebanese officials on Tuesday. “We have a real opportunity to end the conflict, and now is the moment to decide. We are committed to doing everything we can to work with Lebanon and Israel to end this conflict,” Hochstein said at a press conference on Tuesday. Hochstein also met on Tuesday with Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, and he was scheduled to meet with Lebanese Armed Forces commander Gen. Joseph Aoun. Mikati emphasized that Lebanon’s primary objectives are achieving a ceasefire and safeguarding its sovereignty. He highlighted the need to implement international resolutions and bolster the Lebanese Armed Forces in the southern part of the country. Lebanon delivered its written response to the latest U.S. proposal on Monday. According to Ali Hassan Khalil, an aide to Berri, the response included “comments” that were “presented in a positive atmosphere.” He did not provide details on the nature of the comments, saying only that they “affirm the precise adherence to [U.N. Security Council] Resolution 1701 with all its provisions,” according to Reuters. Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem said in a speech on Wednesday that the terrorist group had "read the ceasefire proposal. "We have our comments, and Nabih Berri has comments, and ours and the Lebanese government's comments are, Inshallah ['God willing'], identical," Qassem said. "We have decided not to discuss these ceasefire proposals or our comments in the media. All I will say is that Israeli is trying to obtain through negotiations what it couldn't through war." The terrorist leader vowed to “continue our efforts on the ground, whether the negotiations succeed or not. “We are confronting a savage enemy, and we will remain on the ground, no matter the cost, as we will also increase the cost for the enemy. We are facing Israeli human monsters supported by American human monsters,” threatened Qassem. Disarm and retreat Resolution 1701, which ended the 2006 Second Lebanon War, stipulated that Hezbollah must disarm and retreat north of the Litani River, but was never enforced. The Litani lies some 20 miles from the Israel-Lebanon border. Its enforcement, along with Israeli freedom of operation in Lebanon should Hezbollah violate the terms of a ceasefire agreement, are the key sticking points in the current negotiations. Netanyahu emphasized during a speech in the Knesset plenum on Monday that Israel will not allow Hezbollah to “return to the state it was in on Oct. 6, 2023. “We will be required, in order to ensure our security in the north, to systematically carry out operations—not only against Hezbollah’s attacks, which could come. Even if there is a ceasefire, nobody can guarantee it will hold. So it’s not only our reaction, a preventive reaction, a reaction in the wake of attack but also the capacity to prevent Hezbollah from strengthening,” he said. Hezbollah has launched some 16,000 rockets, missiles and drones from Lebanon at Israel since joining the war in support of Hamas on Oct. 8, 2023, a day after the Gaza-based terrorist group’s massacre in southern Israel. More than 60,000 residents of northern Israel remain internally displaced due to the ongoing rocket and drone attacks from Lebanon. Seventy-six people in northern Israel have been killed by Hezbollah cross-border rocket, missile and drone attacks since the start of the war, including 31 soldiers and six foreign citizens, according to the latest data provided by the Prime Minister’s Office, updated on Sunday. In addition, 729 people have been wounded, including 497 civilians and 232 soldiers. Of these, 29 civilians and 37 soldiers were severely injured; 63 civilians and 38 soldiers were moderately injured and 405 civilians and 157 soldiers were lightly injured. Hezbollah’s leadership has been left in tatters following a series of targeted killings by Israel, including that of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut on Sept. 27. This was preceded by Israeli sabotage of Hezbollah communication devices that killed 39 people and wounded more than 3,400 members of the terrorist group. Israel has been waging a devastating aerial campaign against Hezbollah throughout Lebanon, including its stronghold of Dahieh south of Beirut. According to Israeli estimates, the terrorist group has lost most of its arsenal to the ongoing strikes. Then-Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said in late October that Hezbollah had lost an estimated 80%-plus of its long-range rockets since the start of the war. Israel also continues to battle Hamas terrorists in Gaza. The terrorist group still holds 101 hostages in the Strip, 97 of whom were kidnapped on Oct. 7. Many of the captives are believed to be dead. Brazil summit Meanwhile, G20 leaders gathered in Rio de Janeiro for a summit put out a joint statement on Monday calling for “comprehensive” ceasefires in Gaza and Lebanon. The leaders of the world’s biggest economies called for U.S. proposals to end fighting in Gaza and free the hostages, and one for Lebanon “that enables citizens to return safely to their homes on both sides of the Blue Line.” The 13-point U.S. proposal presented to Lebanese officials on Nov. 14 includes a 60-day truce, during which Lebanon would redeploy its troops along the border. The proposal also calls for Moscow to prevent Hezbollah from resupplying itself via Syrian land routes. Hezbollah would retreat north of the Litani River, with the border area then being under control of the Lebanese Armed Forces, overseen by the United States and Britain. Israeli officials are emphasizing, however, that the Israel Defense Forces must retain freedom of operation in Lebanon to thwart attempts by Hezbollah to violate the agreement and rearm and reestablish itself. A senior Israeli diplomatic official told Israel Hayom on Saturday that the IDF will retain operational freedom to respond to any security threats from across the northern border, regardless of any diplomatic arrangements. However, a source close to Hezbollah told The Washington Post that the group’s “condition for progress remains clear: Israel must be prohibited from conducting operations within Lebanese territory.” Berri emphasized at the time that any ceasefire agreement must not include the ability for Israel to attack by land, sea or air, Channel 12 reported. “Otherwise, what’s the purpose of an agreement?” he remarked. Another sticking point is Lebanon’s objection to the United Kingdom and Germany monitoring the implementation of U.N. Resolution 1701. Beirut reportedly favors the United States and France. If the ceasefire efforts fail, there are plans in the works to expand ground operations in Lebanon, an Israeli military official told the Post. Israel’s Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer discussed the proposal with U.S. President-elect Donald Trump during a visit to his Florida estate earlier this month, as well as with senior Biden administration officials in Washington. Dermer also traveled to Russia to discuss the ceasefire proposal. Tehran is telling its Lebanese terrorist proxy Hezbollah that it supports ending the war against Israel, The New York Times reported over the weekend. Ali Larijani, senior adviser to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, met with senior Lebanese officials in Beirut on Nov. 15 to discuss the matter. Two Iranians affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps told the Times that Larijani conveyed messages to Hezbollah from Khamenei that he supported the end of the war and that the regime would assist with rebuilding the terrorist group’s forces and recovering from the war.](https://jewishwebsite.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Gideon-Saar-1320x880-2-218x150.jpg "Sa’ar: Israel must be free to act against Hezbollah truce violations")
Likewise, Geraldo ignores evidence that the “protest” was organized by Hamas in cooperation with other terror groups. Hamas leaders Ismail Haniyeh and Yehya Sinwar announced that this operation was a step in “liberating all of Palestine, from the river to the sea,” meaning the elimination of the Jewish state.
Geraldo’s portrayal of an oppressive Israeli army mowing down peaceful civilian demonstrators at Israel’s border with the Gaza Strip is at odds with the evidence. He failed to mention that it seems that at least 10 of the persons killed have been identified as known Islamist terrorists. He also ignored evidence that some protesters fired on troops and attempted to break through the border fence. This is further corroborated. Geraldo avoided such possibilities, preferring instead to vilify Israel.
Geraldo’s phrasing, “constant occupation and oppression,” is disinformation. The “occupation” is a myth. Communities of Jews have continuously lived in their ancestral home in the Holy Land including the entirety of Jerusalem and the West Bank (Judea and Samaria). Furthermore, scholars (Joan Peters in “From Time Immemorial,” among others) have shown that most of those who today identify as “Palestinians” descend from relatively recent migrations from surrounding territories. In fact, it’s likely that the Arab population began to blossom only well after the beginning of substantial Jewish immigration in the 19th century.
In 1948, the Jewish nation of Israel, as authorized by the United Nations in 1947 and by previous international rulings, was re-established with the capacity of caring for Jewish refugees form Nazi horrors. Israel had sought to accommodate the Arabs but was immediately rebuffed by Arab Armies that attempted to annihilate the Jewish state. And thereafter Arab forces attacked, or gathered to attack, Israel several times in order to destroy it.
The West Bank is disputed land. Israel is the obligatory and legal military authority of the West Bank, having taken the territory from Jordanian occupation in self-defense in the 1967 Six-Day War. The land is not “Palestinian.” It is disputed. Hence the need for Israeli-Palestinian negotiations according to U.N. Security Council Resolutions 242 (1967) and 338 (1973), and the 1995 Israeli-Palestinian interim agreement.
But the Palestinian Authority insists on various conditions unlikely to be accepted by any Israeli government before peace negotiations can take place, including Israel abiding by Palestinian refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state (evidently, 22 Arab Muslim states is fine but one Jewish state is one too many) and Israel’s acceptance of a “right of return” (that does not exist in international law) for millions of Arabs (nearly all of whom have never lived in Israel), which would inevitably result in the Jewish state becoming unviable.
As to the alleged “oppression,” the Palestinian Authority governs the daily lives of the Palestinian population in the West Bank, while Israel controls the borders and polices the settlements, only entering Palestinian communities to pursue terrorists. Apparently this alleged “constant occupation and oppression” is unable to prevent PA encouragement of murderous attacks on Israeli citizens by generously rewarding the Palestinian terrorist perpetrators and their families. The United States has been providing financial aid to the PA but Congress passed legislation on March 23, 2018 (The Taylor Force Act) to prevent American tax dollars from being used to encourage Palestinian terrorism.
Geraldo’s next vilification of Israel occurred the next day, March 31, on “Fox & Friends” at 9:24 a.m. (Eastern) when he joined Abby Huntsman, Pete Hegseth and Ed Henry. Only Hegseth challenged Geraldo. Hegseth responded appropriately, “The keepers of the concentration camp are Hamas not Israel,” to Geraldo’s description of the Gaza Strip as “the world’s largest concentration camp,” implying Israel was responsible for hardships suffered by residents of the Gaza Strip. Hegseth responded, “You can’t negotiate with Hamas. They’re a terrorist organization that says they want to wipe Israel off the map,” to Geraldo’s allegation that due to Israel, for the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, “Their lives have been controlled since the 1967 war.”
Here, Geraldo repeats erroneous assertions, again ignoring the fact that Israel pulled all its troops and all Israeli residents out of the Gaza Strip in September 2005 while continuing since then to allow large quantities of food, medicine and other humanitarian aid into Gaza while blocking various dangerous incoming materials that could be used to attack Israel.
Hanan and Geraldo
In his March 30/31 castigation of Israel, Geraldo revisited a familiar role. Among previous such Geraldo propaganda bursts are these: In 2012, he fawned over West Bank Palestinian Hanan Ashrawi in a “Geraldo at Large” Fox News Channel special, “Israel Caught in the Crossfire,” filmed in Israel and the Palestinian territories, that aired on July 8, 2012 (10 p.m. Eastern). The hour-long documentary—with Geraldo reporting mainly from Israel and his brother Craig reporting from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank—dealt with several issues including the chances for a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinian Arabs leading to a “two-state solution.” Describing Ashrawi as “a friend I have known for decades,” Geraldo indulged her anti-Israel disinformation. This long-time Geraldo friend has been a long-time anti-Israel propagandist and continues as such.
Ashrawi has discredited herself a number of times. For example, as the only known professing Christian in the otherwise Muslim leadership of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, Ashrawi gave a press conference in 1991 in which she replied to a question in self-righteous indignation, “I find your reference to ‘Judea and Samaria’ a statement of extreme bias, and rather offensive. I am a Palestinian Christian, and I know what Christianity is. I am a descendant of the first Christians in the world, and Jesus Christ was born in my country, in my land. Bethlehem is a Palestinian town. So I will not accept this one-upmanship on Christianity. Nobody has the monopoly.” (The Washington Post, “The Practiced Palestinian,” Caryle Murphy, Nov. 4, 1991)
Conclusion
Geraldo Rivera is generally persuasive on issues he speaks about. His on-air disinformation about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict should immediately be balanced on air with factual information. This is warranted because even one instance of unchallenged disinformation is one too many in terms of planting seeds of antipathy towards Israel in the minds of vulnerable individuals among the millions of FNC viewers.