Category: International

Israel Hits Iran in Multiple Waves of Targeted Bombing Strikes

Israel said it struck military sites in Iran early on Saturday in retaliation for Tehran’s attacks on Israel earlier this month, the latest attack in the escalating conflict between the heavily armed rivals.
Iranian media reported multiple explosions over several hours in the capital and at nearby military bases, but there were no immediate reports of damage or casualties.

Before dawn, Israel’s public broadcaster said three waves of strikes had been completed and that the operation was over.

The Middle East has been on edge awaiting Israel’s retaliation for a ballistic-missile barrage carried out by Iran on Oct. 1, in which around 200 missiles were fired at Israel and one person was killed in the West Bank.

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IDF announces Israel carrying out ‘precise strikes’ on military targets in Iran

The IDF confirms launching strikes in Iran.

In a statement, the IDF says it is carrying out “precise strikes” on Iranian military targets, in response to “months of continuous attacks from the regime in Iran against the State of Israel.”

“The regime in Iran and its proxies in the region have been relentlessly attacking Israel since October 7th – on seven fronts – including direct attacks from Iranian soil,” the military says.

“Like every other sovereign country in the world, the State of Israel has the right and the duty to respond,” the statement continues.

The IDF says its “defensive and offensive capabilities are fully mobilized,” and that it “will do whatever necessary to defend the State of Israel and the people of Israel.”

Ukraine, in an Unlikely Attack on an Iconic Cultural Mainstay, Is Sending Drones Into Russia To Blow Up Its Vodka Distilleries.

In a blow to Russia, Ukraine used the cover of night yesterday to blast four large vodka distilleries. Video clips posted online purported to show alcohol tanks burning fiercely in Tula and Tambov, two Russian regions about 300 miles from eastern Ukraine.

In the largest attack to date on Russia’s alcohol industry, drones flew from Ukraine and set off the pre-dawn blazes. In President Putin’s wartime economy, alcohol distilleries produce vodka for drinking and ethanol for the military machine.

Russia is the world’s largest consumer of vodka — about 21 shots per adult per month, according to the World Population Review. This is about 70 percent more than Ukraine’s per capita consumption and almost five times American consumption.

In a nation where vodka sales average 600 million liters a year, it is unclear whether yesterday’s pyrotechnics will seriously dent Russia’s vodka industry. However, it is a psychological blow to an industry revered by the average Russian man.

In 988, Prince Volodomyr the Great rejected Islam because of Islam’s prohibition of drinking alcohol. Instead, he Christianized Kievan Rus. He is quoted as saying: “Drinking is the joy of all Rus. We cannot exist without its pleasure.”

Vodka was for Tsarist Russia what oil is for modern Russia. In the mid-19th century, vodka taxes accounted for up to 40 percent of government revenue. By 1911, 89 percent of all alcohol sold in Russia was vodka.

In the opening days of Nazi Germany’s 1941 attack on the Soviet Union, the Luftwaffe sought out and severely damaged Moscow’s Kristall, the Soviet Union’s largest distillery. During World War II, Red Army soldiers advanced through Eastern Europe fueled in part by daily rations of two shots of vodka.

This week, it is unlikely that Ukraine’s attack on Russia’s iconic cultural product will galvanize Russians to rally around their President’s war on Ukraine. More likely, it will simply become the latest indignity that Russians have to put up with as they seek to avoid getting dragged into his war.

Two years ago, a national draft order prompted about 1 million Russian men to leave the country. To avoid a repeat this fall, Mr. Putin is burning through oil earnings to buy soldiers. First-time signing bonuses have soared to $25,000, the equivalent of two year’s annual salary for workers outside big cities. Enlistment bonuses rise as hair-raising news from the war front filters back home.

For Russian soldiers, last month was the bloodiest month of the 31-month war, American and British officials say. Daily Russian casualties averaged 1,200 killed or severely wounded a day. Ukraine’s August 6 invasion of a chunk of Russia’s Kursk region has not sparked a surge in enlistments.

“This unprecedented Ukrainian occupation of Russian territory” has exposed what the Atlantic Council’s Ukraine editor, Peter Dickinson, calls “the limitations of the Kremlin war machine.” Mr. Dickinson made that observation two weeks ago in an essay titled “Putin doesn’t have enough troops to defeat Ukraine and defend Russia.”

Mr. Dickinson contended that “while many continue to view the Russian military as an irresistible force with virtually limitless supplies of men and machines, it is now increasingly apparent that in reality, Putin’s attempt to conquer Ukraine has left his army dangerously overstretched and unable to defend Russia.”

In response to this shortage of warriors, Russia is training and equipping as many as 10,000 North Korean soldiers to fight against Ukraine. Ukrainian officials say these units will go to Russia’s Kursk region to join the fight to expel Ukrainian soldiers from Kursk, the first invasion of Russia by a foreign power since World War II. In simple English, this means that the Kremlin is paying foreign mercenaries to liberate Russian soil because Russians will not fight for it.

NSSF Praises SCOTUS Decision to Review Mexico’s Baseless $10 Billion Lawsuit Against Firearm Manufacturers

WASHINGTON, D.C. — NSSF®, The Firearm Industry Trade Association, praised the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to grant Smith & Wesson’s petition to hear Estados Unidos Mexicanos v. Smith & Wesson Brands, Inc., et al., Mexico’s frivolous $10 billion lawsuit against American firearm manufacturers seeking to blame them for the harm caused by lawless narco-terrorist drug cartels in Mexico. Mexico’s lawsuit also seeks to dictate how firearms are made and sold throughout the United States through a federal court injunction, in effect usurping the role of Congress and 50 state legislatures.

NSSF filed an amicus brief earlier this year in support of the Supreme Court granting the case, arguing that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit’s flawed decision, “blows a gaping hole in the PLCAA and rolls out the red carpet for a foreign government intent on vitiating the Second Amendment.” The U.S. Supreme Court will now set a briefing schedule and hold argument, likely early in the new year.

“Today’s announcement by the U.S. Supreme Court that they are granting Smith & Wesson’s petition to hear Mexico’s frivolous $10 billion lawsuit against lawful American firearm manufacturers is welcomed news to the entire firearm industry. Mexico’s lawsuit seeks to blame lawful American firearm businesses for violence in Mexico perpetrated by Mexican narco-terrorist drug cartels and impacting innocent Mexican lives.

It is not the fault of American firearm businesses that follow strict laws and regulations to lawfully manufacture and sell legal products,” said Lawrence G. Keane, NSSF Senior Vice President and General Counsel. “This case represents exactly why Congress passed, and President George W. Bush enacted, the bipartisan Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA).

The case was rightly dismissed by a federal judge before the First Circuit Court of Appeals’ erroneous ruling earlier this year that reversed the district court order and reinstated the case. Lawful American firearm manufacturers follow American laws to make and sell lawful and Constitutionally-protected products. The Mexican government should instead focus on bringing Mexican criminals to justice in Mexican courtrooms.”

Mexico alleges U.S. firearm manufacturers are liable for the criminal violence perpetuated by narco-terrorist drug cartels by refusing to adopt gun control restrictions that exceed what the law requires for the strictly-regulated production and sale of firearms. A U.S. District court in Massachusetts dismissed the case, finding the claims were barred by the PLCAA. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, however, revived the case on Mexico’s appeal earlier this year.

The First Circuit held that Mexico’s claims alleging that the defendants know their regular business practices contribute to illegal firearm trafficking fit within a narrow exception to the PLCAA. Smith & Wesson Brands, Inc., et al, the petitioners, argue the First Circuit erred when it reversed the lower court’s decision to dismiss the case.

The petitioners also noted the First Circuit’s decision to allow for an exception to PLCAA fails because there is no evidence U.S. firearm manufacturers violated federal laws against aiding and abetting firearm trafficking. The petitioners explained to the Supreme Court that Mexico’s complaint “fails to identify any product, policy, or action by the American firearms industry that is deliberately designed to facilitate the unlawful activities of Mexican drug cartels.”

NSSF’s amicus brief concluded by urging Supreme Court action and pointing out that the First Circuit’s decision to reinstate the case was incorrect because it is “… emblematic of a recent trend of anti-gun governments (and courts) mendaciously skirting the PLCAA and using the resulting threat of bankruptcy-inducing tort liability to destroy a lawful industry that is vital to the exercise of a fundamental constitutional right. This Court’s intervention is imperative.”

Hezbollah Confirms Its Leader Has Died in an Israeli Airstrike

Lebanon’s Hezbollah group confirmed on Saturday that its leader and one of its founders, Hassan Nasrallah, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut the previous day.

A statement said Nasrallah “has joined his fellow martyrs.” Hezbollah vowed to “continue the holy war against the enemy and in support of Palestine.”

Nasrallah, who led Hezbollah for more than three decades, is by far the most powerful target to be killed by Israel in weeks of intensified fighting with Hezbollah. The Israeli military said it carried out a precise airstrike on Friday while Hezbollah leadership were meeting at their headquarters in Dahiyeh, south of Beirut.

The Lebanese Health Ministry said six people were killed and 91 injured in the strikes, which leveled six apartment buildings. Ali Karki, the commander of Hezbollah’s Southern Front and other commanders were also killed, the Israeli military said.

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Trump Finally Correct about Jewish Vote.

Last week Donald Trump created a bit of a brouhaha—doesn’t he always?—when he spoke to the Israeli-American Council in Washington regarding the Jewish vote.

The former president made two statements I question to some degree but I heartily agree with his overall conclusion, as excessive as it may seem to some, that Jews that do no vote for him are crazy.

Perhaps it would be better put in the mother tongue and say they are meshugga.

My qualification, such as it is, for saying that is I am Jewish and eighty years old, so have been a Jewish voter now for nearly sixty years.  For forty or so of those years I voted for the Democratic Party candidate no matter who he or she was. I have to admit I did this blindly.  It was a habit, not all that distant from smoking, which I was able to avoid more easily.

In this century I have voted for Republicans, not because I have become a Republican.  I find orthodox party politics noxious, frequently duplicitous and subject to change. Nevertheless, by the start of this century and even more with the candidacy of Barack Obama, it became clear to me that the Democratic Party was no longer what it was, but had become a rallying ground not just, obviously, for anti-Israel/antisemitic propaganda, but also for anti-American and even anti-Western Civilization thinking and policies.

I will get back to this in more detail but first the statements I question lightly.  With Mr. Trump it’s usually a question of rhetoric.  His policies are most always spot on. In this case he alleges that if he loses in 2024, it will be, at least in part, because of the Jewish vote of which, according to a poll he cited, he currently has 40%, up from 29% in 2020 and 25% in 2016.

He believes he deserves a much higher percentage because of all he has done for Israel—the Abraham Accords, moving the embassy to Jerusalem, recognizing the Golan Heights and, most of all, imposing sanctions on Iran while pulling out of the senseless nuclear deal.  He also mentioned that he has Jewish children and grandchildren.

He makes a good case that he has been the most pro-Israel president ever, with the possible exception of Harry Truman who recognized the state.

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Israel Confirms Beirut Airstrike

The Israeli air force killed senior Hezbollah commander Ibrahim Aqil in an airstrike on Beirut. Aqil was in a bunker several feet below a residential building where he was meeting with the top brass of Hezbollah’s operations array and the leadership of the Radwan Force. Aqil was the head of Hezbollah’s military operations and commander of the elite Radwan force. Israel says that he was the commander of the operation to invade the Galilee in an October 7-style strike.

Alongside Aqil, the top brass of Hezbollah’s operations array and the leadership of the Radwan Force were killed in the strike, according to the military. In a statement, the IDF says Aqil was the head of Hezbollah’s military operations, the acting commander of the terror group’s elite Radwan Force, and the head of a plan to invade the Galilee.

“Aqil and the commanders who were eliminated were among the architects of the ‘plan for the occupation of the Galilee,’ in which Hezbollah planned to raid Israeli territory, occupy the communities of the Galilee, murder and kill innocents, similar to what the Hamas terror organization carried out in the murderous massacre on October 7,” the IDF says in the statement.

Aqil was also wanted by the United States for his role in the 1983 Marine barracks bombing in Beirut as well as directing the taking of U.S. hostages in Lebanon during the 1980s. The targeted killing of Aqil is one more sign that war between Israel and Hezbollah is liable to break out at any time.

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BREAKING UPDATE: 8 Killed, 2,750 Wounded, Mostly Hezbollah Terrorists, as Pagers They Use to Communicate Explode Across the Country

LATEST UPDATE: Lebanon’s Health Minister reports that eight people have been killed and 2,750 injured due to exploding pagers across the country, per ABC News.

Over 1,000 individuals, mostly Hezbollah terrorists, were wounded when the pagers they use for communication exploded across Lebanon on Tuesday, according to Reuters.

Authorities are expecting that the number of victims will continue to rise.

The incident, confirmed by security sources, is being called the “biggest security breach” the Iranian-backed Hezbollah terror network has faced since its ongoing war with Israel began.
The explosions, reported by Reuters, occurred at 3:45 p.m. local time. Panic spread as Hezbollah-controlled areas in southern Beirut and other parts of the country were hit with explosions that lasted for over an hour.

Security sources confirmed that the devices were the latest models used by Hezbollah and were thought to be critical in their communications amidst their war efforts against Israel.

Despite Hezbollah’s close ties with Iran, which has been instrumental in supplying the group with weapons and communications technology, this incident marks a significant embarrassment for their operations.

Hezbollah’s use of technology, likely provided through Iranian channels, appears to have backfired in the most dramatic way possible. Even the Iranian ambassador to Lebanon, Mojtaba Amani, was reportedly injured in one of the blasts, according to Iranian media.

All signs indicate a remarkable operation orchestrated by Israel’s Mossad.

More from Reuters:

The pagers that detonated were the latest model brought in by Hezbollah in recent months, three security sources said.

The wave of explosions lasted around an hour after the initial detonations, which took place about 3:45 p.m. local time (1345 GMT). It was not immediately clear how the devices were detonated.[…]

Lebanon’s crisis operations center, which is run by the health ministry, asked all medical workers to head to their respective hospitals to help cope with the massive numbers of wounded coming in for urgent care. It said health care workers should not use pagers.

The Lebanese Red Cross said more than 50 ambulances and 300 emergency medical staff were dispatched to help in the evacuation of victims.

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What Could Go Wrong? It’s Possible US Navy Will Escort Philippine Ships in South China Sea

The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (yes, that’s really what they call it) has been acting aggressively towards Philippine shipping and fishing vessels in the South China Sea for some time now. Because of this, the United States Navy is now reportedly “open to consultations” about the possibility of using American ships to escort Philippine shipping through the contested area.

What could possibly go wrong with that?

The U.S. military is open to consultations about escorting Philippine ships in the disputed South China Sea, the head of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command said Tuesday amid a spike in hostilities between Beijing and Manila in the disputed waters.

Adm. Samuel Paparo’s remarks, which he made in response to a question during a news conference in Manila with Philippine Armed Forces chief Gen. Romeo Brawner Jr., provided a glimpse of the mindset of one of the highest American military commanders outside the U.S. mainland on a prospective operation that would risk putting U.S. Navy ships in direct collisions with those of China.

Granted the Philippines is a U.S. ally, at a time when we can use all the friendly faces in the west Pacific that we can find. We have important bases in the Philippines, which occupy a strategic location. But our ally is butting heads with China rather a lot lately:

China and the Philippines accused each other of causing a collision between their two vessels Saturday in the latest flareup of tensions over disputed waters and maritime features in the South China Sea.

In a statement posted on social media, Chinese coast guard spokesperson Liu Dejun was quoted as saying that a Philippine ship maneuvered and “deliberately collided” with a Chinese coast guard ship “in an unprofessional and dangerous manner.”

Philippine officials in Manila said it was their coast guard ship, the BRP Teresa Magbanua, that was rammed thrice by the Chinese coast guard without any provocation, causing damage to the Philippine vessel.

This is the kind of incident that we are going to be escorting Philippine shipping through. What happens when a Chinese Coast Guard captain “accidentally” bumps into a U.S. Navy frigate or destroyer?

These are the kinds of flashpoints that can start wars. And, candidly, we aren’t ready for a war in the West Pacific.

That’s not to say that we shouldn’t stand by an ally. We have treaty obligations to consider, namely the 1951 U.S.-Philippines Mutual Defense Treaty.

But there’s just a lot that can go wrong when things are this tense. China, by which we can only mean the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), has been showing increasing bellicosity in the West Pacific for quite a while. Under Chairman Xi, it is facing a host of problems; a moribund economy that they have been trying to conceal, a population that is about to walk off a demographic cliff, and a real-estate bubble in the process of bursting; this is a recipe for national leaders becoming increasingly irrational.

China is not showing aggression solely towards the Philippines, either. Japan has been the target of China’s bellicosity lately too.

Granted with many of these actions China is probably, as the saying goes, testing the waters. We do the same thing, calling it the exercise of the right of passage in international waters or airspace, as the case may be. Russia does it too; every seafaring nation does these things.

But for some reason, China is pushing harder on the Philippines, perhaps because that nation’s military is, unlike Japan, rather modest – but surely China knows that the United States has a mutual defense treaty with the Philippines, which makes one wonder what, at the end of the day, they are really trying to accomplish.

And, of course, there is the visible weakness and incompetence of American leadership to consider.

One wonders what General Douglas MacArthur might have said.

Hostage Taken on October 7 Freed by Israel in ‘Complex’ Military Operation.

Some Israelis are saying that the rescue of Kaid Farhan al-Qadi, a hostage held in Gaza since his abduction during Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack, is reminiscent of the “Miracle of Entebbe” where 102 hostages were rescued by 100 Israeli commandos on July 3-4, 1976.

The IDF described the rescue operation as “complex.” As is customary, no details were released to the public about the operation.

What is known is that Mr. al-Qadi is back in the bosom of his family.

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We Need to Rethink Our Assumptions About Nuclear Weapons Use
One of the Strategic Purposes of the Kursk Offensive

I was struck by the messaging of the Ukrainian government over the last 24 hours—and just how it has tied the need for long-range strike into the strategic purpose of the Kursk Offensive. Its both an immediate question, and at the same time a broad one about how and when nuclear weapons might be used. What Ukraine is doing, is driving an invasion force directly through an existing consensus—basically saying the emperor has no clothes when it comes to nuclear weapons usage. The Ukrainians are saying all your assumptions and strategic plans on nuclear weapons are wrong—and they seem to be right. The implications of this are profound.

The Kursk Offensive and Nuclear Red-Lines

The Kursk Offensive by Ukraine clearly has a number of strategic objectives. There is an attempt to force the Russians to redeploy forces to try and stop it (and to protect the Russian border as a whole). There is the attempt to politically embarrass Vladimir Putin by showing that he cant protect the very soil of Russia itself. There is an attempt to demonstrate to the world that the Russian Army remains deeply flawed. And there is the objective of destroying Russian forces as they have to be sent to try and stop the Ukrainians offensive. Its one of the reasons that the offensive makes strategic sense for Ukraine—it has a large number of potential benefits, from the battlefield to geopolitics.

However one other possible benefit—or at least strategic goal—has risen to the fore in the last 24 hours. It shows the final hollowness of all the nuclear threats that have been used for years to limit aid to Ukraine. This is actually a profound moment in intellectual thinking—as the Ukrainians are driving a coach and horses (or more obviously a Bradley IFV) directly through almost all earlier assumptions about when and how nuclear weapons will be used. They are invading, taking and possibly holding the sovereign soil of a nuclear power—and in doing so they are upending everyone’s way of thinking about nuclear weapons.

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Without Freedom of Thought, there can be no such Thing as Wisdom; and no such Thing as publick Liberty, without Freedom of Speech; which is the Right of every Man, as far as by it, he does not hurt or controul the Right of another: And this is the only Check it ought to suffer, and the only Bounds it ought to know.

This sacred Privilege is so essential to free Governments, that the Security of Property, and the Freedom of Speech always go together; and in those wretched Countries where a Man cannot call his Tongue his own, he can scarce call any Thing else his own. Whoever would overthrow the Liberty of a Nation, must begin by subduing the Freeness of Speech; a Thing terrible to Publick Traytors.
– Benjamin Franklin

BLUF
The U.K. government must crack down on lawless riots in its streets. But in the long run, its creep into truly Orwellian levels of censorship poses a far bigger threat to its citizens’ freedom than any riot ever could. And this whole saga serves as a reminder to Americans as to why we should cherish our First Amendment because without strict legal protections for free speech, even a Western nation can quickly descend into dystopia

The UK descends into dystopian levels of censorship.

“Think before you post.”

That’s the chilling message that was just posted from social media accounts affiliated with the United Kingdom’s government. Amid the riots and civil unrest in the streets of Britain that were initially sparked by anti-immigration protesters, the posts warned citizens not directly involved in the uprisings that they too could face arrest even just for their speech.

“Content that incites violence or hatred isn’t just harmful — it can be illegal,” the Crown Prosecution Service tweeted. “The CPS takes online violence seriously and will prosecute when the legal test is met. Remind those close to you to share responsibly or face the consequences.”

These aren’t just idle threats, either.

Stephen Parkinson, the director of public prosecutions of England and Wales, warned that there are “dedicated police officers” tasked with “scouring social media” to “follow up with identification [and] arrests” when people “publish or distribute material which is insulting or abusive which is intended to or likely to start racial hatred.”

This censorious effort is coming from the top levels of government. In an interview with Sky News, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said social media is “not a law-free zone” and that he wanted to issue “a reminder to everyone that whether you’re directly involved or whether you’re remotely involved, you’re culpable, and you will be put before the courts if you’ve broken the law.”

The arrests have already begun.

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Federal Judge Tosses Majority of Mexico’s Lawsuit Against Gun Makers

For the second time, a federal judge in Massachusetts has dismissed the vast majority of Mexico’s lawsuit against multiple U.S. gun makers that accuses the companies of knowingly and willfully facilitating cartel violence south of the border. U.S. District Judge F. Dennis Saylor first threw out Mexico’s complaint in 2022, opining that the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act precluded Mexico’s lawsuit, but the litigation was reinstated by the First Circuit Court of Appeals a short time later.

Now Saylor has once again dismissed the case against six of the seven gun makers sued by the Mexican government, ruling that the plaintiff has been “unable to muster sufficient proof to establish a sufficient relationship between the claimed injuries and the business transactions of any of the six defendants in Massachusetts.”

The core question for jurisdictional purposes is whether Mexico’s claims against the six moving defendants “arise” from their business transactions in Massachusetts. See Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 223A, § 3(a).

As to those defendants, the connection of this matter to Massachusetts is gossamer-thin at best. The government of Mexico is obviously not a citizen of Massachusetts. None of the six moving defendants is incorporated in Massachusetts, and none has a principal place of business in Massachusetts.

There is no evidence that any of them have a manufacturing facility, or even a sales office, in Massachusetts. None of the alleged injuries occurred in Massachusetts. No Massachusetts citizen is alleged to have suffered any injury. And plaintiff has not identified any specific firearm, or set of firearms, that was sold in Massachusetts and caused injury in Mexico.

Furthermore—and despite the generous use of the word “defendants” throughout—the complaint does not actually allege the existence of a joint enterprise, joint venture, or civil conspiracy among the various defendants. There is no question, therefore, that personal jurisdiction must be proved separately as to each of the six moving defendants.

At its core, plaintiff’s jurisdictional theory is based on statistical probabilities.

Its reasoning may be characterized as follows:
(1) each of the six moving defendants sold firearms to distributors and retailers in each of the 50 states;
(2) each of the six defendants sold some (undetermined) number of firearms to Massachusetts-based distributors or retailers;
(3) some (undetermined) number of the firearms that were sold by each of the six defendants nationwide were illegally trafficked to Mexico;
(4) some (undetermined) number of the firearms that were trafficked to Mexico caused injury there; and therefore
(5) at least some of the firearms sold by each of the six defendants to Massachusetts entities must have caused injuries in Mexico.

Mexico’s legal team, which includes former Brady Campaign attorney Jonathan Lowy (who now heads up an outfit called Global Action on Gun Violence), brought in an economist to try to estimate the number of guns that were originally purchased in Massachusetts but were trafficked to Mexico. The judge, however, wasn’t persuaded by what she found.

To do so, she relied upon two principal datasets: a set that recorded the manufacturer of certain firearms recovered in Mexico between 2010 and 2021, and a “trace and recovery” dataset created by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (“ATF”) concerning firearms recovered in Mexico between 1989 and 2001.

She then used that data to estimate the number of firearms that she believes were likely trafficked into Mexico after a Massachusetts sale over the last ten years. 

As explained below, however, that report is problematic in multiple respects—beginning with the fact that Congress has prohibited the use of the ATF data in any civil action, and thus a critical foundation of her opinion must be disregarded.

Furthermore, her opinion stops short of estimating the number of firearms manufactured by each defendant that actually caused an injury in Mexico—a critical link to connect defendants’ business in Massachusetts to plaintiff’s claims. Under the circumstances, her opinion is not sufficient to prove the necessary jurisdictional nexus.

That’s embarrassing for the gun control activists, or at least it would be if it didn’t give them a new talking point about Congress tying the hands of “gun safety advocates” when it comes to using ATF data. As far as the Mexican government is concerned, however, Saylor’s ruling is a total loss. The only remaining defendants are Smith & Wesson, which was headquartered in Massachusetts during the time period in question, as well as a wholesaler who wasn’t a part of this particular request to dismiss the case.

While Mexico’s lawsuit, which seeks $10 billion in damages from gun makers, isn’t completely dead, Saylor’s ruling is a big step in that direction. The final blow to the litigation could come from the Supreme Court, which is set to consider the gun companies’ appeal of the First Circuit ruling that reinstated the lawsuit in its September 30th conference. As the gun makers argued in their cert petition:

To be clear, Mexico’s complaint does not include any groundbreaking factual revelations, nor does it uncover any secret dealings between the cartels and America’s firearms companies.

Instead, Mexico’s suit challenges how the American firearms industry has openly operated in broad daylight for years. It faults the defendants for producing common firearms like the AR-15; for allowing their products to hold more than ten rounds; for failing to restrict the purchase of firearms by regular citizens; and for refusing to go beyond what American law already requires for the safe production and sale of firearms.

In Mexico’s eyes, continuing these lawful practices amounts to aiding and abetting the cartels. According to Mexico, American firearms companies are liable because they have refused to adopt policies to curtail the supply of firearms smuggled south—such as making only “sporting rifles,” or combining sales to those with a “legitimate need” for a firearm (as defined by Mexico).

This lawsuit is basically an attempt to allow the Mexican government to impose its own preferred gun control policies on the U.S. firearms industry by blaming gun makers for cartel violence.

SCOTUS should grant cert and dismiss the case altogether, but we won’t know if the Court will grant cert for another few months.

Now We Know Exactly How Israel Assassinated Hamas Chief, and I’m Laughing Inappropriately

Sometimes you have to go with your gut instincts, and I wish I’d stuck with mine yesterday.

Wednesday morning it was my happy duty to report on the assassination of Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, Iran, the night before. “My first thought was that a Mossad assassination team had snuck in, done some dirty work that needed doing, and then snuck back out,” is what my gut assured me had happened. But then reports came in that Haniyeh had been killed in a precision airstrike. But no.

“Never trust first reports.” I’m going to write that on a blackboard 100 times later today — and not for the first time, either.

If you weren’t familiar with Haniyeh or missed yesterday’s column, he was usually presented as the “moderate” face of Hamas because our press seems to be largely made up of willing dupes and terrorist sympathizers. They would never put it that way, of course. In their minds, they’re just on the side of “the oppressed.” In Haniyeh’s case, he was oppressed to the tune of an estimated three billion dollars he’d skimmed off of Western relief funds for the Arabs of Gaza.

Haniyeh has been on the State Department’s Specially Designated Global Terrorists list since 2018 for his “close links with Hamas’ military wing” and for his support of “armed struggle, including against civilians.” The State Department report also said, “He has reportedly been involved in terrorist attacks against Israeli citizens.” Even the International Criminal Court, often useless in the extreme, sought an arrest warrant for Haniyeh earlier this year for “war crimes and crimes against humanity including murder, rape, torture and taking hostages,” involving the Hamas Oct. 7 terror invasion of Israel.

So don’t be fooled. Haniyeh finally got it as good as he’d spent his foul existence giving it.

Israel has been going hard after Hamas leadership since Oct. 7 and an airstrike in April — possibly with Haniyeh in mind — killed three of his sons who were then praised as martyrs. Haniyeh is also now being praised as a martyr by his vicious former hosts in Tehran.

“At the appropriate time and place, we will have a suitable response,” Mohammed Baqer Qalibaf, Speaker of the Iranian Parliament said at Haniyeh’s memorial on Wednesday. “It is hard for us that our guest died a martyr’s death. We will avenge the blood of the martyr Haniyeh, who was the voice of the oppressed Palestinian people.”

Now then, about that martyrdom…

Haniyeh had been staying at a “heavily guarded complex” in Tehran, according to the New York Times — an official state guesthouse “run and protected by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.” Nevertheless, Israel was able to

  • Ascertain which room Haniyeh used during his stays there.
  • Slip a remote-detonated bomb under his mattress.
  • Ascertain when Haniyeh was back in Tehran.
  • Make bomb go boom while Haniyeh slept.

This is all according to local sources who spoke to the Times with the usual protection of anonymity.

As martyrdoms go, Haniyeh’s was delightfully ignominious — in no small part due to Israeli operational genius, plus serious failures on the part of Iranian intelligence and the dreaded Revolutionary Guard. I shouldn’t laugh, but I just can’t help it.

Iran has vowed to strike directly at Israel in retaliation, so please consider this a developing story

FAFO Factor 10

Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh killed in Iran

CAIRO, July 31 (Reuters) – Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was assassinated in the early hours of the morning in Iran, the Palestinian militant group said on Wednesday, drawing fears of wider escalation in a region shaken by Israel’s war in Gaza and a worsening conflict in Lebanon.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards confirmed the death of Haniyeh, hours after he attended a swearing in ceremony for the country’s new president, and said it was investigating.

There was no immediate comment from Israel. The Israeli military said it was conducting a situational assessment but had not issued any new security guidelines for civilians.
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Washington would work to try to ease tensions but said the United States would help defend Israel if it were attacked.

The news, which came less than 24 hours after Israel claimed to have killed the Hezbollah commander it said was behind a deadly strike in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, appears to set back chances of any imminent ceasefire agreement in Gaza.

“This assassination by the Israeli occupation of Brother Haniyeh is a grave escalation that aims to break the will of Hamas,” senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri told Reuters.
He said Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist group that ruled Gaza, would continue the path it was following, adding: “We are confident of victory.”
Iran’s top security body is expected to meet to decide Iran’s strategy in reaction to the death of Haniyeh, a close ally of Tehran, said a source with knowledge of the meeting.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas condemned the killing of Haniyeh and Palestinian factions in the occupied West Bank called for a general strike and mass demonstrations.
Haniyeh, normally based in Qatar, has been the face of the Palestinian group’s international diplomacy as the war set off by the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7 has raged in Gaza, where three of his sons were killed in an Israeli airstrike.

The International Criminal Court prosecutor office requested an arrest warrant for him over alleged war crimes at the same time it issued a similar request against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Appointed to the Hamas top job in 2017, Haniyeh has moved between Turkey and Qatar’s capital Doha, escaping the travel curbs of the blockaded Gaza Strip and enabling him to act as a negotiator in ceasefire talks or to talk to Hamas’ ally Iran.

The assassination of Haniyeh comes as Israel’s campaign in Gaza approaches the end of its 10th month with no sign of an end to a conflict that has shaken the Middle East and threatened to spiral into a wider regional conflict.

Despite anger at Netanyau’s government from families of the Israeli hostages still held in Gaza and mounting international pressure for a ceasefire, talks brokered by Egypt and Qatar appear to have faltered.
At the same time, the risk of a war between Israel and Hezbollah has grown following the strike in the Golan Heights that killed 12 children in a Druze village on Saturday and the subsequent killing of the senior Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr.

The war started on Oct. 7 when Hamas-led fighters broke through security barriers around Gaza and launched a devastating attack on Israeli communities nearby, killing 1,200 people and abducting some 250 hostages into Gaza.

In response, Israel launched a relentless ground and air offensive in the densely populated coastal enclave that has killed more than 39,000 people and left more than 2 million facing a severe humanitarian crisis.