Former President Barack Obama called the Israel-Hamas conflict a “moral reckoning for all of us” at an event hosted by his foundation Friday.
Obama spoke at the Obama Foundation’s Democracy Forum on Thursday, where he called for a two-state solution and an end to the “occupation,” while not clarifying what occupation he meant.
“All of this is taking place against the backdrop of decades of failure to achieve a durable peace for both Israelis and Palestinians,” the former president told the forum audience.
Hussein Obama had to weigh in because his brothers in Gaza are paying the price. Having killed 1400 Israelis, the IDF has unleashed the Mother of all Wars on Hamas. When the job is complete Hamas will be no mas. This was not a war Israel wanted, but the killing of innocents, babies and mothers, they had no choice but to clean out the vermin that is a stone’s throw away.
JERUSALEM — In his daily briefings, Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari regularly reminds Israelis that the war against Hamas in Gaza is being fought from “the air, the sea and the land,” yet he misses out on one important arena that is likely to become the focus as Israel sends its troops deeper into the Palestinian enclave: The vast web of underground tunnels built by Hamas.
According to those who closely track the Iranian-backed terror group, as well as admissions by its own leaders, Hamas has built an approximately 300-mile subterranean system that snakes beneath civilian homes, schools and hospitals in urban areas of the Gaza Strip.
And for the past three weeks – since its forces carried out a massive and brutal terrorist attack inside Israel on Oct. 7 – Hamas’ leadership, both political and military, has been safely holed up down there as Israeli fighter jets pound the territory from above.
On Wednesday during a briefing with the foreign press, Hagari said the massive damage in the Jabalia refugee camp after an Israeli airstrike on Tuesday was worsened by the fact that there were tunnels underneath the densely packed urban area. Locals reported seeing sinkholes opening up under the bombed-out buildings.
As Israeli ground forces expand further inside Gaza, the IDF will be forced to turn its attention to this underground battlefield, which is a challenge faced in other recent conflicts, particularly in the Middle East, but never on this scale, experts told Fox News Digital this week.
ISRAEL’S HUNT FOR HAMAS TERROR GROUP LEADER YAHYA SINWAR: ‘DEAD MAN WALKING’
“Tunnels turn the battlefield into a multidimensional battlefield, which is not the case in regular urban terrain, and that is something that must be considered as part of the operational challenges,” continued Richemond-Barak, also a research fellow at the Modern War Institute at West Point.
“As they (the IDF) advance into Gaza, they might be ambushed by tunnels behind them or below them in a most violent and unsettling fashion,” she said.
Such a scenario actually happened to an elite force of Israeli soldiers during a previous round of fighting in Gaza. In the 2014 conflict that Israelis refer to as Operation Protective Edge, three Israeli soldiers were ambushed by Hamas terrorists who succeeded in dragging the dead body of one of the soldiers, Lt. Hadar Goldin, into a secret tunnel. Israelis were shocked by this action, which happened during a U.N.-mediated cease-fire, and have been fighting to return Goldin’s body ever since.
Plestia Alaqad (Instagram handle @byplestia) has more than a million followers and calls herself an independent journalist but spread the lie on Instagram and in an interview with British TV that Israel bombed the Al-Ahli Hospital and killed more than 1,000 people.
“Yesterday, a complete massacre happened,” she said of the missile, which was quickly proven to be a misfired Islamic Jihad rocket and not connected to Israel at all. “Around 1,000 civilians were killed and martyred.”
Fewer than 50 people were killed in the incident, according to international independent investigations.
Social media users recoiled after “Squad” member and pro-Palestinian Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., released a video demanding President Biden support a cease-fire to stop “the genocide of the Palestinian people” or face electoral consequences in 2024.
Tlaib’s post on X, formerly known as Twitter, condemned Biden’s declaration that the U.S. stands with Israel and opposes a cease-fire, telling him, “the majority of the American people are not with you on this one. #CeasefireNow.” (WRONG – AMERICAN PEOPLE ARE WITH ISRAEL)
The post also included a video of scenes from Gaza and protests in the U.S., interspersed with clips from Biden, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The scenes included protest chants from Ohio saying, “No peace on stolen land!” Illinois “Free! Free! Palestine!” and Michigan “From the river to the sea.”
The Spectator contributing editor Stephen Miller shared a screenshot of the video’s “From the river to the sea!” shot and asked, “Hi congresswoman, hey kind of a newb to all of this. What does this mean exactly? Thanks for any clarity you can provide.”
Former counterterrorism expert Nathan Sales told Fox News that the Palestinian chant represents a call for the “extermination of the Jewish state.”
Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., addresses attendees as she takes part in a protest calling for a ceasefire in Gaza outside the U.S. Capitol, in Washington, U.S., October 18, 2023. (REUTERS/Leah Millis)
Following backlash, Tlaib claimed, “From the river to the sea is an aspirational call for freedom, human rights, and peaceful coexistence, not death, destruction, or hate. My work and advocacy is always centered in justice and dignity for all people no matter faith or ethnicity.”
We are talking SEDITIONRepresentative Tlaib has been on the leading edge of a group of Democrats critical of the president’s embrace of Israel, but the accusation marks an extraordinary broadside from a lawmaker of his own party.
Reporting from Washington 
Representative Rashida Tlaib, Democrat of Michigan and an outspoken voice for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war, released a video on Friday that accused President Biden of supporting the genocide of Palestinians.
Congresswoman @RashidaTlaib tells cheering crowd that Trump impeachment coming
“We’re going to go in and impeach the motherfucker” pic.twitter.com/oQJYqR78IA
— Jon Levine (@LevineJonathan) January 4, 2019
Tlaib’s campaign has paid $147,000 to Unbought Power LLC, a political consulting and advocacy firm run by Rasha Mubarak, since March 2020. Tlaib’s leadership PAC, Rooted in Community Leadership, which lists Mubarak as a “treasurer,” has paid Unbought Power another $23,000 since October 2020, according to Federal Elections Commission (FEC) filings reviewed by Fox News Digital.
Mubarak, a “Palestinian Muslim American community activist,” has a history of making anti-Israel statements online and calling Israel an “apartheid state.”
“These aren’t clashes— it’s an ongoing occupation. These aren’t evictions— they are forced expulsions,” Mubarak tweeted in May of last year. “This isn’t a conflict— it’s settler colonialism, it’s ethnic cleansing, it’s oppression, it’s apartheid.”
“Say it loud. Say it clear. Palestine will be FREE,” she continued with the hashtag “#SaveSheikhJarrah.”
Mubarak also attacked Democratic Rep. Ted Deutch of Florida, who is Jewish, in September of last year over his remarks pushing back against Tlaib labeling Israel an apartheid state.
“Oh look it’s [Deutch] throwing another tantrum,” the “activist” tweeted. “He used his time to attack [Tlaib] for underscoring facts also made by Human Rights Watch [and B’Tselem] — Israel is indeed an apartheid state.”
“He’s flustered [because] how else does one rebuttal the truth?” she claimed. “Bullying [and] disparagement.”
