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→Notes part III: Jan 6, 2026+
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Antisemitic caricature appears in New Jersey Christmas pageant.
Jewish caricature in Ukrainian Christmas tradition resurfaces at New Jersey church, drawing criticism.
Jackie Hajdenberg, JTA. Jan 17, 2026, 6:36 PM (GMT+2)
It had all the trappings of a conventional Christmas pageant: the three wise men, Christmas carols, and children dressed as angels.
But there was a twist: This pageant, performed on Sunday in New Jersey, also included a Hasidic Jewish caricature
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421027 INN]
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David Cunio recounts the hell of his captivity: 'The thought of my family kept me alive'.
"For a long time, we survived on 250 milliliters of water and half a pita per day," he says.
i24NEWS.
January 13, 2026 at 02:14 PM
David Cunio Recounts The Hell Of His Captivity: 'The Thought Of My Family ...
3 days ago — The most difficult moment for David, however, was the separation. On the 49th day, Sharon and the girls were released as part of the first hostage agreement, while he remained a prisoner. “Saying goodbye to Sharon, Yuli, and Emma was the worst moment of my life,” he confides. “I was begging not to be left behind.”
In the tunnels of Gaza, he endured extreme deprivation and mistreatment. “No food, no water. For a long time, we survived on 250 milliliters of water and half a pita per day,” he recounts. The hostages were forced to stand up whenever their captors passed by, despite weakness and dizziness, sometimes to the point of fainting.
[https://www.i24news.tv/en/news/israel-at-war/artc-david-cunio-recounts-the-hell-of-his-captivity-the-thought-of-my-family-kept-me-alive i24]
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British police chief admits: ‘I passed false information on Maccabi Tel Aviv fans because of AI’.
West Midlands Police chief apologizes to Parliament after admitting inaccurate intelligence used to bar Israeli fans from a Europa League match was generated by an AI tool, not verified reporting
ynet|01.14.26 |
[https://www.ynetnews.com/sport/article/bynraehbwx YNet]
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Hamas Figures Express Support For Iranian Regime: The Protestors Are Agents Of Israel And The U.S.; Iran Must Attack Israel.
January 14, 2026.
Iran, Palestinians I Special Dispatch No. 12329.
In response to the mass protests in Iran, which are being brutally suppressed by the regime there, figures affiliated with and close to Hamas have voiced clear and unequivocal support for the Iranian regime, which for decades has assisted Hamas with weapons and funding...
[https://www.memri.org/reports/hamas-figures-express-support-iranian-regime-protestors-are-agents-israel-and-us-iran-must MEMRI]
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What is the actual death toll of the Iranian protests? | DW News.
Jan 15, 2026 #iran #protests #qatar
Human rights groups say more than 2,500 people have been killed since anti-government protests erupted in Iran some three weeks ago. The Iranian government has been carrying out a vicious crackdown.
"These figures, 12 thousands or 10 thousand, that are being circulated. They are laughable compared to we have seen."
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQvbi-CWYVc&t=1m37s pn YouTube]
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Report: UN Experts Silent on Iran.
January 14, 2026.
United Nations.
According to a report published today by the Swiss non-governmental organization UN Watch, the majority of UN human rights experts—known officially as Special Procedures—have been mostly silent on the Islamic Republic’s violent crackdown against civilian protests since December 28, 2025. This includes experts who routinely speak out on Israel and are quick to condemn the United States.
[https://unwatch.org/report-un-experts-silent-on-iran/ UNWarch]
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The hypocrisy of the luvvies over Iran is sickening.
Compared to the anti-Israel outcry, the double standards are despicable.
This regime is one of the most monstrous on earth. We must all combat it.
Allister Heath.
14 January 2026 6:33pm GMT
Where are the luvvies when you need them? Where is their outrage, their fury, their passion as thousands of freedom-loving Iranians, sons and daughters, are being massacred by millenarian Islamist theocrats?
Many Leftist entertainers, personalities and activists spent years occupying our streets, flooding social media, denouncing Israel’s just war of self-defence in Gaza as “genocide”, and yet now, when actual crimes against humanity are being committed in Iran, their near-silence is deafening. Every horror they claimed, falsely, Israel was inflicting upon Palestinians, the Iranian regime is actually meting out to its own people: protesters are being shot in the back of the head or machine-gunned in the streets, hospital rooms are being broken into, young people summarily executed, dissidents tortured.
It is pure, unadulterated evil, an obscene moment in history, a stain on humanity. So where are the chants of “from the Gulf to the Caspian Sea, Iran will be free”? Where is Greta Thunberg’s flotilla? Why isn’t Bob Vylan firing up the crowds against the Ayatollahs? Where are the pins, the Shir o Khorshid emblems, the pictures of Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, the emojis, the student protestors, the sit-ins, the storming of lectures, the mass demonstrations taking over central London?
The hypocrisy is sickening, the double standards despicable. The luvvies don’t really care about Iran, just as they are largely unbothered by deaths in Sudan, the persecution of the Uyghurs and the pogroms of October 7. They are more interested in demonising Israel and the West than in saving innocent lives.
The human rights lawyers, the ICC, the ICJ and all the other acronyms have proved equally useless, and we are still waiting for the UN resolutions and investigations. Three months ago, the UN Human Rights Council elected an Iranian regime diplomat to its advisory committee, an Orwellian parody if ever there was one. Tom Fletcher, the UN under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, falsely claimed last year that “14,000 babies” were facing starvation within 48 hours in Gaza, fuelling much anti-Israel hatred. As of Wednesday evening, his X feed has so far made no mention of the horrendously real Iranian massacre.
Why is there no such thing as LGBTQ+ for Iran, or Iranian Lives Matter, or Justice for Iran, or groups advocating “intersectional resistance” to the Ayatollahs’ “patriarchy and occupation”?
If you are the wrong kind of victim, the luvvies don’t care about you. As long as a regime is anti-Western, its atrocities don’t matter, or are whitewashed.
Where have those who supposedly care about ethnic cleansing been as millions of Iranians fled their beloved homeland since 1979, fuelling a diaspora of 4-6 million?
Erfan Soltani, 26, will be executed for demanding basic rights. Where are the anti-death penalty advocates who always protest America’s penal regime? Iran persecutes gays, women and religious minorities. Where are those bishops who claim to care about religious freedom in the Middle East? Where are all those who keep telling us (wrongly) that America is turning into a Handmaid’s Tale, when confronted with a real-world, woman-hating theocracy?
The Iranian director and filmmaker, Javad Ganji, was murdered last week. Why didn’t anybody at the Golden Globes care? Why did Mark Ruffalo not mention him? Where was the solidarity?
Mojtaba Torshiz, a former midfielder for Tractor, the Iranian football league winners, left his daughters with his parents and went out to protest. He and his wife were murdered. Rebin Moradi, 17, one of Tehran’s most promising youth footballers, was assassinated. Where are the international footballing authorities? Where are the Premier League footballers taking the knee?
For many not especially ideological celebrities or activists, loudly supporting Gaza was an act, a performative ritual, to signal their virtue, their membership of the high-status “good people’s” club. Iran’s young are heroes, taking on IRGC thugs and dying for their beliefs, yet speaking up for them isn’t modish, so the celebs keep shtum.
Such behaviour is despicable, but not as bad as those of the true believers. Millions of educated people across Europe and America have succumbed to the omnicause, an anti-Western, totalitarian mindvirus, the byproduct of hundreds of years of intellectual error from Jean-Jacques Rousseau to Karl Marx, from Jacques Derrida to Edward Said, laced with Leninism, superstition, conspiratorial thinking and prejudice.
The omnicause deems America, Israel and the capitalist world as the epitome of Westernness, the fount of all evil, guilty of every “ism” and “cide”, and thus promotes and supports third worldist regimes and causes that undermine our societies. It is nihilistic and shape-changing, embracing any doctrine that advances its ends, regardless of contradictions.
Countries and movements are judged according to what they represent, not their actions; the Iranian revolution of 1979 is the original fusion of Leftism and Islamism, so it remains a model for deluded proponents of the omnicause.
This is why so few Western activists support Iran’s freedom-fighters. These dissidents are pro-freedom, pro-America and pro-democracy. They curse Hamas and Hezbollah, and demand the end to Tehran’s handouts to its proxies, anathema to our useful idiots.
The “oppressed” aren’t meant to have agency, so sinister motives must be attributed to the protesters, such as being in hock to foreign spies.
The Left dismiss their critics as “Islamophobic”, so cannot process scenes from Iran where women burn their compulsory hijabs and where crowds reject state-enforced religion as part of a secularist uprising.
There is a growing grassroots alliance between the Jewish and Iranian diasporas. There are Israeli flags in every anti-regime demo in Britain and America, and imperial Iranian flags in every pro-Israel demo. The regime-funded death squads of October 7 were horrifically similar to those roaming Iranian cities today; one day, a free Tehran will resemble Tel Aviv.
The failure of the Islamist dictatorship is total. The banks are collapsing. Chants of “Jāvid Shāh”, long live the Shah, dominate anti-regime demos; only a total break with the past 47 years will suffice.
The luvvies have disgraced themselves. This regime is one of the most monstrous on earth. We must all combat it. Its collapse, when it comes, will be akin to the fall of the Berlin Wall – but this time, rather than being freed from communism, millions will be liberated from Islamism. Long live a free Iran.
[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/01/14/silence-luvvies-iran-exposes-left-war-on-west-middle-east/ DailyTelegraph]
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Azar @Azar_Javidan:
There has been a massacre in Iran in last few days, with estimates of more than 30,000 innocent, unarmed civilians being slaughtered by machine guns in the streets.
The World Should Wake Up
Do Not Look Away
#JavidShah
#MassacreInIran
Quote:
Azar @Azar_Javidan
·
Jan 14
Machine guns vs civilians in Tehran.
A genocide is unfolding in Iran.
Be the voice of Iran.
[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/G-o7QdhXMAE0bJf?format=jpg&name=small]
#MassacreInIran
#JavidShah
#JavidShahRevolution
[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/G-t25NUXkAER8Z4?format=jpg&name=360x360]
[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/G-t25N0bQAgabe6?format=jpg&name=360x360]
[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/G-t25NzbQAMEU_N?format=jpg&name=360x360]
[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/G-t25N1bQAcq88s?format=jpg&name=360x360]
5:06 PM · Jan 15, 2026
[https://x.com/Azar_Javidan/status/2011832388750299169 on X]
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Forced confession fears as Iran chief justice interrogates protesters.
Paris (France) (AFP) – Iran's hardline judiciary chief has personally interrogated protesters arrested in a crackdown that has sparked an international outcry, amplifying fears among rights groups about the use of "forced confessions" to instil fear in society.
Issued on: 01/15/2026 - 16:25
On Thursday, state television showed Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, who has spent his career at the heart of the Islamic republic's legal apparatus and has been sanctioned by both the European Union and United States, quizzing several people the authorities accuse of being "rioters".
It aired footage of the former intelligence minister and top Tehran prosecutor interrogating two detained women, their faces blurred, both of whom broke down in tears while questioned.
The day earlier, he had spent five hours inside one of the prisons of Tehran to examine the cases of prisoners arrested in the protests, state television said, showing him interrogating some detainees.
According to rights groups, state television has broadcast dozens such "confessions" of individuals accused of attacks on security forces and other acts of violence in the demonstrations.
"State media began airing the forced confessions of protesters within days of the outbreak of protests," said Norway-based Iran Human Rights.
"Confessions that were obtained under coercion and torture being aired prior to legal proceedings violate the right of defendants to be presumed innocent until proven guilty," it added.
In another example, the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency said two teenage girls arrested in the central city of Isfahan were shown in "forced confessions" saying they received money from an individual to participate in street protests.
The use of such alleged admissions comes against the backdrop of a crackdown that rights group say has left thousands dead in rallies that have openly challenged the authority of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
'Work quickly'.
In the latest footage, Ejei was shown seated in a room flanked by other officials, beneath a double picture of Khamenei and revolutionary founder Ruhollah Khomeini. The detainee sat in a chair opposite.
One woman, accused of sending a message to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said: "I've done something that even I can’t forgive myself for."
"For what... to who," pressed Ejei, speaking softly while clasping his hands.
Another woman is accused of dropping concrete blocks on security forces in Tehran from a balcony.
"I don't know what happened, why I did something so foolish," she said, after Ejei pressed her by asking, "What was the day?" and "How did you know they were officers?"
No further evidence of their alleged involvement was shown.
US-based group United Against Nuclear Iran in 2024 described Ejei, who has vowed fast-track trials for those arrested, as a "ruthless enforcer of the Islamic republic with no regard for human rights".
Opposition groups also accuse him of involvement in the 1988 mass execution of political prisoners in the Islamic republic.
Media freedom NGO Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has said he has "journalists' blood on his hands", recalling that Ejei in 2004 even bit a journalist on the shoulder during a debate.
"If a person burned someone, beheaded someone and set them on fire then we must do our work quickly," Ejei said on Wednesday.
With any delays, "it wouldn't have the same effect," he said.
[https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20260115-forced-confession-fears-as-iran-chief-justice-interrogates-protesters France24]
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Iran attack postponed but not canceled: The reasons, and the brutal repression that achieved its goal.
Analysis: Washington concluded that potential costs - harm to American bases, Israel, and energy industry in the Gulf - far outweigh any strategic gain and will return to diplomacy; Meanwhile, Iranians are terrified of the brutal suppression of the protest and have stopped.
Ron Ben-Yishai|01.15.26 | 22:21
[https://www.ynetnews.com/opinions-analysis/article/hkzqg0iswe YNet]
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Iran regime leaders ordering own children to slaughter civilians, commander’s daughter says.
January 16, 2026 | 2:54pm
Ruthless Iranian regime leaders are now ordering their own children to slaughter innocent civilians, a commander’s distraught daughter revealed as she sobbed in a gut-wrenching interview on Thursday.
The woman broke down on Persian media outlet Manoto TV as she said leaders are “Giving them batons, electric batons, guns, to go and kill fellow citizens,” adding her father has ordered her “to kill.”
“They are killing their own children, suppressing them,” she said of the regime’s commanders.
[https://nypost.com/video/iran-regime-leaders-ordering-own-children-to-slaughter-civilians-commanders-daughter-says/ NYPost]
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Germany urges ban on AI-generated fake Holocaust images to prevent historical distortion.
German memorial institutions and the government are urging social media platforms to halt the spread of AI-generated fake Holocaust images, clearly distinguish them from authentic material and label them, warning that such content distorts history and harms the memory of the victims
Reuters|01.16.26 22:57
[https://www.ynetnews.com/jewish-world/article/r1uep700b11e YNet]
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Killers on the go.
REGIME IMPORTS KILLERS: 5,000 Iraqi Militia Fighters Cross Border to Slaughter Iranian Protesters.
As the Ayatollahs lose control of the streets, they are bringing in foreign mercenaries from Kataib Hezbollah and the PMF to do the dirty work. European and Iraqi military sources confirm the invasion
Yair Kleinbaum.
Jan 16, 2026
[https://www.jfeed.com/news/iranian-regime-iraqi-militia-crackdown JFeed]
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🎗️ Jonah
@jonahelshout:
30,000 Killed?
Goldie Ghamari Says #Iran’s #Uprising Could Topple the Regime.
@gghamari is a[n] Iranian Canadian lawyer
[youtube.com]
30,000 Killed? Goldie Ghamari Says Iran’s Uprising Could Topple the...
Jan 16, 2026
[https://x.com/jonahelshout/status/2012241525057413144 on X]
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Rawan Osman.
January 15, 2026.
The Iranian people are victims of the “Free Palestine” camp and its leaders.
Silence is complicity — and they still have the nerve to cry “hypocrisy.”
[https://www.facebook.com/reel/1294841126010843/ on FB]
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6,000 sought care for eye injuries in Tehran during protests.
January 15, 2026
More than 6,000 people with eye injuries have sought treatment at a major eye clinic in Tehran over the past few days following recent protests, the head of the Munich Eye Center told Iran International.
Amir Mobarez Parasta said the figure reflected the scale of eye trauma cases linked to the unrest, based on information he said he had received from his colleagues.
He said the number pointed to widespread eye injuries in recent days.
[https://www.iranintl.com/en/202601150995 IranIntl]
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Pay for bullets: How Iran pressures families after killing protesters.
Arash Sohrabi.
January 15, 2026
Updated: 14:56 GMT
After Iran’s deadliest protest crackdown in decades, authorities have extended their response beyond the streets into morgues, hospitals and family homes, turning the protesters’ bodies into a key tool for suppressing dissent and controlling the narrative.
Iran International has received a large volume of videos, audio testimonies and written accounts describing how the bodies of protesters killed in the latest unrest are being collected, stored and released under strict security conditions.
While a nationwide internet blackout, now about a week, has made independent verification difficult in some cases, Iran International has cross-checked and verified key elements through corroborating footage, eyewitness commentary and the consistency of reports from multiple cities.
[https://www.iranintl.com/en/202601151162 IranIntl]
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Iranian forces attacked peaceful protesters with knives, live fire - sources
January 15, 2026.
Iran’s security forces attacked protesters with knives and live gunfire in the northern town of Chamestan during demonstrations on January 8 and 9, local sources told Iran International.
Reports also indicate that security personnel fired live ammunition, targeting a number of protesters.
During the January 9 demonstrations in Chamestan, around 26 bodies were lying on the city’s main street, according to local sources.
[https://www.iranintl.com/en/202601153988 IranIntl]
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Anti-Israel protesters enter BBC Scotland HQ.
Israel National News.
Jan 15, 2026, 8:01 PM
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/420968 INN]
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Israel declares Iranian bank a terrorist organization.
Israel National News.
Jan 15, 2026, 7:01 PM
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/420964 INN]
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The dramatic phone call between Netanyahu and Trump.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke with US President Donald Trump and reportedly asked him to delay the possibility of a military strike on Iran.
Israel National News.
Jan 15, 2026, 8:41 PM
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/420972 INN]
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UK:
NHS doctor suspended over social media posts praising Hamas.
Israel National News.
Jan 15, 2026, 8:42 PM
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/420971 INN]
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The Israel Institute of New Zealand:
"In 2 years of fighting in Gaza, 30k militants and 30-40k civilians died.
The world screamed genocide[sic].
In 2 weeks, the Iranian regime has massacred 20k civilians.
The world looked away."
@israel_advocacy.
January 16, 2026.
[https://www.facebook.com/Israel.Institute.NZ/posts/in-2-years-of-fighting-in-gaza-30k-militants-and-30-40k-civilians-diedthe-world-/1181432964204379/ on FB]
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middleeastbull18:
January 16, 2026
London witnessed a massive demonstration as around 30,000 protesters, including Iranians, Israelis and international supporters, gathered in central areas to express solidarity with Iran’s protest movement. Demonstrators called for freedom, human rights and an end to repression, highlighting growing global concern over the situation in Iran.
#LondonProtest #IranProtests #IranFreedom #HumanRights #GlobalSolidarity #WorldNews #BreakingNews #FreeIran #TrendingNow #FreeIran #HumanRights #BreakingNews #StandWithIran
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Blackout.
HEADLINE: IRAN GOES DARK UNTIL MARCH: Regime Burns Its Own Cities as Martial Law Descends After 5 PM.
Russian sources confirm the internet blackout will last months. In Rasht, security forces torched a historic market to trap protesters as the country enters a new phase of total repression.
Yair Kleinbaum.
Jan 16, 2026
[https://www.jfeed.com/news/t8z1ad HFeex]
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Corpse of slain Iranian mother of two found in grim 'warehouse of bodies'.
January 16, 2026
The body bags at Tehran’s main cemetery were stacked in their many hundreds on rows and on shelves, according to an eyewitness, who found among the corpses of slain protestors his friend, a 41-year-old mother of two.
[https://www.iranintl.com/en/202601168709 IranIntl]
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At least 1.5 million people took to Tehran streets on January 8, source says.
January 16, 2026
[https://www.iranintl.com/en/202601162278 IranIntl]
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Defiance met with massacre: Iran’s biggest protest wave in generations.
January 16, 2026
[https://www.iranintl.com/en/202601151368 IranIntl]
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Pay for bullets: How Iran pressures families after killing protesters.
January 16, 2026
[https://www.iranintl.com/en/202601151162 IranIntl]
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Steven Phillips, MD @StevePhillipsMD
Declassified U.S. State Department telegram quoting an Arab League meeting in Lebanon in August 1960, when Arab states decided to create a "Palestinian entity" aimed at undermining Israel through UN manipulation & military action.
With the help of the Soviets, this resulted in the 1964 founding of the PLO, as a tool for collective Arab action against Israel, consistent with Russia's efforts to counter Israel's alliance with the West.
Arab-Soviet alliances during the Cold War shaped modern Palestinian nationalism primarily as an anti-Israel strategy rather than an indigenous pre-1948 movement.
Defund the UN.
[https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1961-63v17/d34]
Jan 16, 2026
Download the app and never miss what’s happening.
[https://x.com/StevePhillipsMD/status/2011995124335599727 on X]
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Trump Says Laura Loomer ‘Can Be a Little Nasty,’ But Is ‘Always Nice’ to Him: ‘That’s All That Matters’.
Kathryn Wilkens.
Fri, January 16, 2026 at 10:34 PM UTC
During a Friday press appearance
to mark the renaming of a Palm Beach boulevard in his honor, President Donald Trump said that right-wing commentator
Laura Loomer “can be a little nasty” but is “always nice” to him, adding, “And that’s all that matters.”
While touting the success of the “extraordinarily red” state of Florida, Trump reflected on one year ago, when “we were a dead country.”
Now, he said, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar are investing “two trillion dollars” each into the United States. “So we took in six trillion,” Trump claimed. “That’s why we have 18, because we took six from three countries. That helps, right? Laura? Is that right?” Trump said, gesturing to Loomer in the crowd.
Importantly, per a November Bloomberg investigation, the “actual investment promises are significantly smaller, raising questions not just over the size of Trump’s claimed boom but the nature, durability, and real economic impact of the influx he wants credit for.”
“Hi, Laura,” the president continued on Friday, amidst cheers from the crowd. “Boy, you are something. What spirit you have. Laura Loomer. Thank you, honey, for being here. I appreciate it.”
“You know, she can be a little nasty, but to me, she’s always nice, and that’s all that matters,” Trump said. “I want her to stay that way, too.”
According to two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning author James Risen in July, Loomer acts as “Trump’s de facto national security adviser.”
Earlier on Friday, Loomer actually slammed
the president for meeting with former Fox host Tucker Carlson in the West Wing, writing, “Every time Tucker Qatarlson visits the White House, GOP voter turnout decreases.”
In a follow-up post, she added, “Looks like the 2 million Iranian American voters will be sitting out in the midterms,” insinuating that Carlson’s July interview with the president of Iran somehow influenced Trump not to use military force as the country “continue[s] to murder thousands of innocent people.”
[https://www.mediaite.com/media/news/trump-says-laura-loomer-can-be-a-little-nasty-but-is-always-nice-to-him-thats-all-that-matters/ MediaIte]
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🚨 BREAKING: Multiple Iranians INJURED In London - UK Police Crackdown On Anti-IRGC Protesters.
Tousi TV.
January 16, 2026.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yg5AAIhakoU on YouTube]
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Trump's help did not come, and the protest in Iran faded: "There is a lot of death".
Guy Elster. January 16, 2026.
Iran's nationwide protest movement appeared to be slowing down on Thursday, weighed down by a brutal crackdown by the authorities that has left thousands dead and tens of thousands in prison. In Tehran, Iranians reported relative calm on the streets, just a week after the protests peaked in Tehran and elsewhere in the capital, escalating into clashes between demonstrators and security forces. But they were brutally suppressed. A resident of the capital, Tehran, where the protest began in a bazaar two and a half weeks ago, told Al Jazeera that there was a heightened security presence alongside uncertainty about the future. "There is a large military presence on the streets of the capital and elsewhere," the resident said. He said Revolutionary Guards had been deployed in the capital, along with numerous checkpoints and police checkpoints. He added that armed forces were patrolling the streets on motorcycles. “There is a lot of uncertainty. A lot of people are worried,” said the resident, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of his safety. He said many expect American action soon, but opinions are divided about its implications. “There is a lot of death, sadness and anger.”
According to reports in American and other media outlets, Trump was under heavy pressure from leaders in the Middle East not to launch strikes, a move that would almost certainly lead to Iranian retaliatory strikes against American bases throughout the region. The New York Times reported that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the American president during a phone call, and Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar and Egypt were also among those pressuring him to give Tehran "another chance." On social media, some Iranians expressed disappointment at Trump's apparent withdrawal from military intervention. An artificial intelligence image showing Trump removing a mask and revealing former President Barack Obama - who was perceived among the Iranian diaspora as taking a soft line towards Iran - was widely circulated. The slowdown in protests came just two days after US President Donald Trump called on Iranians to "keep protesting - take over your institutions," and promised that "help is on the way." Intelligence assessments have indicated that the United States is preparing to attack Iran, a move Trump has threatened if the Iranian government continues to kill protesters. But on Wednesday night, Trump appeared to back away from the brink of military intervention, telling reporters that Iranian authorities were halting executions. “We’ve been told that the killing in Iran has stopped — it has stopped — it has stopped now. And there is no plan for executions, or executions, or executions — I’ve been told by a very competent source,” Trump said.
The White House later claimed that 800 executions planned in Iran had been canceled. White House spokeswoman Carolyn Levitt said Trump and his team had warned of “serious consequences” if the killings continued. “The president understands that today 800 executions that were planned and were scheduled to take place yesterday have been stopped,” she said. However, she said Trump continues to monitor the situation closely. “All options are still on the table for the president,” Levitt said. U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Walz reiterated this at a U.N. Security Council meeting on Thursday night, saying the United States stands with “the brave people of Iran” and that Trump “has made it clear that all options are on the table to stop the massacre.” Iran's deputy ambassador to the UN, Hossein Darazi, sharply criticized the United States for what he called its "direct involvement in turning the unrest in Iran into violence." "Under the hollow pretext of concern for the Iranian people and claims of supporting human rights, the United States is trying to present itself as the friend of the Iranian people, while at the same time laying the foundations for political subversion and military intervention under a supposedly 'humanitarian' narrative," Darazi said. Russia's UN ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia, accused the United States of convening the meeting in an attempt to "justify open aggression and interference in the internal affairs of a sovereign state." Russia defended Iran's actions and was the only member of the council to do so. France's UN ambassador, Jerome Bonfon, called for the immediate release of all arbitrarily detained detainees and a moratorium on the death penalty, while Britain's deputy ambassador, Archibald Young, said that "Iran must urgently change course" and respect the fundamental rights of its citizens, "including the right to demonstrate without fear of violence or repression." At least 2,637 people have been killed in the protests, according to the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency.
Human rights groups have expressed concern about forced confessions among detained protesters after state media broadcast footage of the head of the hardline judiciary, Gholam-Hossein Mohsani Ajayi, personally interrogating detainees. Ajayi, who is subject to US and European sanctions, is accused by opposition figures of involvement in the mass executions of political prisoners in 1988. Footage broadcast yesterday showed Ajayi interrogating women, one of whom was accused of sending a message to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Another woman, accused of throwing concrete blocks at security forces, said during her interrogation by Ajayi: “I don’t know what happened, why did I do such a stupid thing.” From the beginning of the protests, state media broadcast footage of such confessions, as part of an attempt to portray the protests as a movement that originated from foreign intervention aimed at destabilizing Iran. The Norway-based Iran Human Rights organization said: “The broadcast of confessions obtained under duress and torture before legal proceedings violates the right of defendants to be presumed innocent until proven guilty.” The protests began on December 28 following a sharp drop in the value of the local currency, and quickly expanded to demands for political reforms and even an end to the Iranian regime’s rule. The protest spread to all 31 provinces of the country and is the most serious wave of unrest the government has faced in decades. Iranian President Masoud Pazakhian said yesterday that the government was working to improve living conditions in the country and to address the factors that ignited the protests. He pledged to fight corruption and price gouging, which he said would improve citizens’ purchasing power. Iran’s national currency has lost about two-thirds of its value in the past three years, while the prices of basic goods have soared, with food prices rising by 72% since last year. Experts have said that while the protests point to deep-seated problems in Iran's system of government that are likely to plague it in the long term, a state collapse is unlikely. This concern has also been raised by Israeli and Arab officials, who have told the US administration in recent days that the Iranian regime is not yet weak enough for US strikes to topple it.
[https://hamal.co.il/main/%D7%94%D7%A2%D7%96%D7%A8%D7%94-%D7%A9%D7%9C-%D7%98%D7%A8%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%A4-%D7%9C%D7%90-%D7%91%D7%90%D7%94-%D7%95%D7%94%D7%9E%D7%97%D7%90%D7%94-%D7%91%D7%90%D7%99%D7%A8%D7%90%D7%9F-%D7%93%D7%A2%D7%9B%D7%94-%D7%99%D7%A9-%D7%94%D7%A8%D7%91%D7%94-%D7%9E%D7%95%D7%95%D7%AA%D7%B4-238849 Hamal]
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Melika Razavi (Poker player, Magician, Writer, Miss global Iran 2016, Miss global fitness 2016, Miss power woman 2017).
melirazavii:
Jan 16, 2026.
This is Iran.
This is what the Islamic Republic looks like.
This is genocide, not “governance.”
Over 25,000 people are dead — men, women, children — murdered by their own government. Internet shut down. Communications cut. Streets turned into war zones so killing can happen in silence.
And still, some of you defend this regime.
Not because you care about Iranians — but because of ideology, money, and comfort.
Call it what it is.
IRGC. ISIS. Hamas.
Different names, same violence, same terror, same blood on their hands.
Silence is complicity.
Excuses are cowardice.
History will remember who spoke up — and who chose comfort over humanity.
#Iran #IranGenocide #IslamicRepublic #IRGC #HumanRights StopTheSilence FreeIran.
[https://www.instagram.com/p/DTil8figotW/ On Instagram]
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Spawn of Iran’s ruling elite living large in US — and fed-up Iranian-Americans want them deported.
By Bianca Heyward.
Published Jan. 14, 2026, 8:58 p.m. ET
The pampered offspring of Iran’s ruling elite are living the American Dream as the country’s brutal regime kills protesters by the thousands — and fed-up Iranians in California and across the US want them out.
Two explosive online petitions have been gaining steam as they call on the US government to immediately deport Eissa Hashemi and Fatemeh Ardeshir-Larijani — the children of current and onetime prominent Iranian government figures enjoying the comforts of the “Great Satan’’ as opposed to the oppressive streets of Tehran.
Eissa Hashemi is the 43-year-old son of Masoumeh Ebtekar — a k a “Screaming Mary,” the radical spokeswoman for the militants who stormed the US Embassy in Tehran in 1979 and held 52 Americans hostage for 444 days.
His mom was notorious for trying to create propaganda during the hostage crisis by cruelly urging the US victims to describe their horrific ordeal in positive terms.
“If she were on fire on the street, I wouldn’t piss on her to put it out,’’ traumatized former hostage Michael Metrinko once said.
After her son Hashemi graduated from the University of Tehran in 2006, he reportedly moved to the US in 2010 and pursued his Ph.D. in organizational leadership from The Chicago School in LA.
He currently is an adjunct associate professor at his alma mater, enjoying the freedom his mother helped strip from American diplomats decades ago.
Records show he resides in Agoura Hills in LA County.
Hashemi also did not respond to Post requests for comment.
Then there is Ardeshir-Larijani.
She is the daughter of Ali Larijani, the powerful former speaker of the country’s parliament who now serves as secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council.
Her father serves as a righthand man to Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has called the US the “Great Satan.”
Not long after President Trump urged Iranians to keep demonstrating against their nation’s dictatorship and condemned its officials for the “senseless killing of protestors,” Larijani fired back at him on X.
“We declare the names of the main killers of the people of Iran: 1- Trump 2- Netanyahu,” Larijani wrote, referring to the president and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanhayu.
Ardeshir-Larijani, 40, lives in Atlanta, Ga., as her father rails against the West and oversees a legislative body that regularly burns the stars and stripes.
She is a licensed doctor and an assistant professor in the hematology and medical oncology department at the prestigious Emory University School of Medicine — and a world away from the deadly crackdown on human rights in Iran.
She did not respond to Post requests for comment Wednesday.
“Why are visas given to these people?’’ raged Mersedeh Shahinkar, who lost her right eye to a bullet during a protest involving women’s rights in Iran in 2022, to The Post on Wednesday.
“Why should they freely travel and live comfortably here? If Iran is good for them, if the Islamic Republic is good for them, they should go live there,” the California resident said.
The petitions on Change.org argue that it is a slap in the face to the American people — and the Iranian people suffering under the regime — to allow the relatives to stay here.
“We, the Iranian people, demand the deportation of these individuals,” the petitions read. “They benefit from the wealth of the Iranian people and live safely in the United States, while their families rule a brutal dictatorship in Iran.”
The petitions were created on Jan. 11 and 12 by “Iran Etehad” and have already collected tens of thousands of signatures.
The White House did not respond to a Post request for comment on whether the administration might try to boot the relatives
[https://nypost.com/2026/01/14/us-news/spawn-of-irans-ruling-elite-living-large-in-us-and-fed-up-iranian-americans-want-them-deported/ NYPost]
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When Iran shakes, the axis holds its breath: proxies brace for a mothership crash.
Opinion: Iran’s proxies watch unrest with alarm, fearing collapse, as Gulf rivals warn it could leave Arabs 'under the Israeli hammer alone'.
Dr. Michael Milshtein|01.17.26
[https://www.ynetnews.com/magazine/article/skxkcodh11e YNet]
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Michigan event to feature daughter of convicted Hamas fundraiser.
The panel event will discuss what organizers call the “wrongful imprisonment” of the “Holy Land Five,” convicted in 2008 for funneling approximately $12.4 million to Hamas.
(Jan. 16, 2026 / JNS)
A panel discussion on the “Holy Land Five” scheduled for Jan. 17 in Grand Rapids, Mich., will feature the daughter of one of the five Palestinian-Americans convicted in 2008 for providing material support to Hamas.
Nida Abu Baker, daughter of Shukri Abu Baker, “will share her story and recount the decades of struggle to free her father and his colleagues in the Holy Land Foundation—the largest Muslim nonprofit in the U.S. that was targeted with trumped-up material support for terrorism charges,” event organizers stated.
Five officials of the foundation, nicknamed the “Holy Land Five,” were convicted in Dallas in November 2008 on “108 charges of funneling $12.4 million to Hamas, a designated foreign terrorist organization,” according to Canary Mission.
[https://www.jns.org/michigan-event-to-feature-daughter-of-convicted-hamas-fundraiser/ JNS]
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US sanctions Houthi revenue, procurement networks.
Scott Bessent, U.S. treasury secretary, stated that “the Houthis threaten the United States by committing acts of terror and attacking commercial vessels transiting the Red Sea.”
(Jan. 16, 2026 / JNS)
The United States imposed new sanctions on the Houthis on Friday, targeting networks that U.S. officials say help fund the group’s attacks and destabilizing activity in the region.
[https://www.jns.org/us-sanctions-houthi-revenue-procurement-networks/ JNS]
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Israel rejects Trump's Gaza Peace Council
Prime Minister Netanyahu announced that Trump's Gaza Peace Council was contrary to Israeli policy.
Orly Harari.
Published: Jan 17, 2026, 6:53 PM (GMT+2)
The Prime Minister’s Office said Saturday night that the announcement regarding the composition of the Gaza Peace Council, which is subordinate to the peace conference, was made without coordination with Israel and contradicts Israeli policy.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu instructed Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar to raise the matter with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid criticized the government, saying: “For a year I have warned that if the government does not advance the Egyptian solution with the United States and the international community, Turkey and Qatar will end up influencing Gaza. Last night the makeup of the so-called ‘Peace Council’ was revealed. Turkey is included, Qatar is included, and according to the IDF Hamas still has 30,000 fighters in Gaza. This represents a complete diplomatic failure by the Netanyahu government, wasting the immense courage and sacrifice of IDF soldiers and commanders."
U.S. President Donald Trump announced Friday night the members of the Peace Council that will oversee the Gaza Strip. According to Trump, who will chair the body, its members include U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff; his son-in-law Jared Kushner; Secretary of State Marco Rubio; former British prime minister Tony Blair; businessman Mark Rowan; World Bank President Ajay Banga; and U.S. Deputy National Security Adviser Robert Gabriel.
The Turkish president’s office said Trump sent a letter to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan inviting him to join the Peace Council, which is intended to supervise the interim administration in Gaza.
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421030 INN]
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Nick Fuentes: My problem with Trump ‘is that he is not Hitler’.
Nick Fuentes escalates rhetoric, says US President Donald Trump falls short of extremist agenda.
Joseph Strauss, JTA.
Jan 17, 2026, 7:51 PM (GMT+2)
In the fall, a video of Nick Fuentes criticizing US President Donald Trump drew the praise of progressive ex-Congressman Jamaal Bowman.
“Finally getting it Nick," Bowman commented, apparently recognizing some common ground between himself on the left and Fuentes, on the far right, who said in the video that Trump was “better than the Democrats for Israel, for the oil and gas industry, for Silicon Valley, for Wall Street," but said he wasn’t “better for us."
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421032 INN]
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Bondi at IAC:
'DOJ will seek death penalty in murder of Israeli diplomats'.
Yoni Kempinski, Florida.
Jan 18, 2026, 3:18 AM
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421052 INN]
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Released hostage: I agreed to die in Gaza so that Israel could destroy Hamas.
Hamas captivity survivor Eitan Mor expresses support for his father's position, says he refused offer to spy for Hamas.
Israel National News.
Published: Jan 17, 2026, 10:38 PM (GMT+2)
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421043 INN]
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Watch: Arab rioters attack Samaria homestead.
On Friday, dozens of Arab rioters from the villages of Qaddum and Beit Lid attacked residents of the Shirat Tzion homestead in Samaria.
Israel National News.
Jan 17, 2026, 11:59 PM (GMT+2)
[Samaria. Hilltop Youth]
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421048 INN]
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From Slogan to Industry: The invention of “Anti-Palestinian Racism".
APR is a dangerous term that suggests that trying to combat antisemitism is itself racist against Palestinian Arabs. A full report is linked below. Op-ed.
David Collier.
Jan 18, 2026, 7:20 AM (GMT+2)
In recent years the term anti-Palestinian racism (APR) has moved from activist discourse into the language of public institutions across multiple Western democracies. In the UK it has now been raised in both Houses of Parliament. In the U.S. a group of elected officials turned the phrase into a political weapon. In Canada, the Canadian government provided funding to support the creation of APR educational resources. And in Australia, the public broadcaster recently gave favourable coverage to a report claiming anti-Palestinian racism was “widespread."
If you are not paying attention, you should be. While APR markets itself as part of serious anti-racist discourse, in reality it functions as a dangerous, antisemitic tool. APR doesn’t just try to name a prejudice. It rewires the moral rules. It turns Zionism into racism, Jewish self-definition into exclusion, and antisemitism safeguards into “censorship" - then demands institutions enforce that inversion as policy.
Once inverted framing takes hold, everything becomes distorted. Neutrality is recast as hostility. Jewish communal safety is treated as an obstacle. And the most aggressive forms of anti-Israel activism are rebranded as “anti-racist" virtue. None of this directly causes violence, but it changes the climate: what can be said, what must be tolerated, and further marginalises a Jewish community that is already under considerable threat.
And the truly scary part of all this? It was designed that way.
The pro-Corbyn network that incubated APR
Today I publish a report (available for download) that traces the origins of the term anti-Palestinian racism, and shows how it evolved from a fringe activist slogan into a deliberately weaponised framework within the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement.
The turning point came on 4 September 2018. The National Executive Committee (NEC) of the Labour Party had just voted to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, along with all its examples. The NEC adoption was a major defeat for Jeremy Corbyn and his supporters.
Until then, APR was largely confined to the online activist ecosystem around the Electronic Intifada, a fringe anti-Israel outlet.
Inside a key Corbyn support group there was an immediate reaction. Palestine Live was a Facebook group set to “Secret" visibility. Members included leading figures from Israel-hostile organisations, along with journalists and community organisers. The UK-founded network had an international feel, with representation from groups in North America and beyond.
Since 2015, Palestine Live had operated as a pro-Corbyn network. In early 2018, I published an exposé documenting the high levels of antisemitism and anti-Jewish conspiracy theories circulating inside the group, which triggered complaints and a formal party investigation.
The Invention of Anti-Palestinian Racism
A day after the NEC vote, one of the then administrators of Palestine Liveposted a reaction to it. The message was simple and stark: “The Labour Party has an anti-Palestinian racism problem":
This linkage is at the heart of APR: it suggests that trying to combat antisemitism is itself racist against Palestinian Arabs.
Later the same month, a member of Palestine Live posted an anonymously written definition of anti-Palestinian racism. The following day, the pro-Corbyn activist group Jewish Voice for Labour, many of whose leaders were members of Palestine Live, published a slightly refined version on their website. APR, in recognisable form, had arrived.
The Internationalisation and Institutionalisation of Anti-Palestinian Racism
A few weeks later, on 16 October 2018, the U.S.-based anti-Zionist outlet Mondoweisspublished an updated version, tightening the JVL version and polishing it for an international audience. There were now ten clauses in the definition, with the author suggesting the examples were absolutes, or “indisputable examples of anti-Palestinian racism."
Under this definition of APR, denying the (often false) narratives of anti-Israel activism, supporting the right of Israel to exist or even accusing someone of antisemitism could make you a racist.
The framework was now complete. It pushed back against efforts to combat antisemitism, while creating an atmosphere in which activist claims and antisemitic commentary became moral absolutes that could not be challenged.
Once this definition of anti-Palestinian racism had been introduced, it began to be incorporated as a key tool in the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) arsenal:
In 2019, the Canadian government introduced a new anti-racism strategy “Building a Foundation for Change." The policy framework created a pathway for NGOs to propose new conceptualisations of racism and, potentially, to receive public funding.
Anti-Israel activists saw the opening, and launched an intensive campaign in Canada. In 2022, the Arab Canadian Lawyers Association (ACLA) finally introduced a codified definition of anti-Palestinian Arab racism.
The ACLA definition reads as a formal rewrite of the JVL and Mondoweiss versions. It is less concerned with addressing prejudice than with recasting Jewish identity and Jewish self-determination as racist.
The Canadian government has since awarded ACLA a grant of CAN$100,000 to develop educational tools and provide training on the subject of APR.
The deed was done. APR had moved from an activist smear to a government-funded weapon.
The Weaponisation of Anti-Palestinian Racism.
Having been incubated in the UK, internationalised in the U.S., and then codified in Canada, the Canadian government’s financial support officially legitimised the concept of anti-Palestinian racism. From this point, the ACLA definition could export itself internationally.
In both the U.S. and Australia, activist NGOs produced official-looking reports claiming APR was a widespread, urgent problem. Both supported the inclusion of educational material in schools as a key recommendation. These documents failed to meet basic academic standards, yet still received favourable treatment.
The term became a political weapon. In one U.S. state, a Senate resolution has been introduced labelling a tragic incident as an act of APR, even though there is no evidence at all to support it.
In the UK, Labour MP Nadia Whittome has been campaigning to get the UK government to recognise APR, and in March 2025 tabled a written question asking if the government will introduce educational material to tackle the problem in schools:
And it gets worse. On 16 July 2025, Manchester City Counciladopted a motion recognising the need to challenge anti-Palestinian racism.
What does this mean in practice? It means a sitting MP wants to introduce a framework that functions as an antisemitic propaganda weapon into schools, while Manchester City Council moved to reframe antisemitism safeguards as suspect, and to legitimise unsubstantiated activist narratives. If anyone objects, they could be accused of racism.
Changing the Air People Breathe
Seventy-eight days later, just three miles away from the Town Hall, came the Yom Kippur terrorist attack at the Heaton Park synagogue. Two people were killed.
Manchester was not the only city where APR was being promoted against a backdrop of rising antisemitism. On 26 September there was an event launching a report into APR in Sydney. The venue was the Maritime Union Conference Centre. Just six miles from there, and seventy-nine days later, fifteen people were slaughtered in an antisemitic terror attack during a Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach.
APR may not be directly responsible for either terrorist attack, but it is still a dangerous ideological weapon. APR reshapes the institutional climate. It is designed to change the air that people breathe.
The Jewish people are vulnerable and under attack around the world. Deliberately problematic concepts such as APR must not be allowed to make things worse than they are already.
The pushback starts here. Download the full report [https://david-collier.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/260115_anti_Palestinian_racism_final.pdf] and distribute it to local politicians, councils, journalists, and anyone involved in combating antisemitism.
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421058 INN]
Since when did grandchildren of immigrants become a separate "race?"
Arabs are Arabs are Arabs, whether with an Israeli ID or "palestine" paper.
The bigoted invented "APR," no wonder the same infamous racist 'iskandar323' pushes this on Wikipedia and had just removed data from the 30,000 massacred in 1988 Iran. A typical supporter of genocidal Islamists, Hamas or Iran. Just like the ORGANIZED gang of 32 wikipedians backing this. All "decide" what is a RS.
[https://myrightword.blogspot.com/2026/01/the-palestine-entity-1960.html?showComment=1768781555040&m=1#c8841279863333103188 at MyRightWord]
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'Every family knows a victim': Iranians in exile speak out on mass killings.
Negar Mojtahedi.
Iran International.
Jan 17, 2026, 23:18 GMT
([https://i.iranintl.com/images/rdk9umy0/production/19026d7036f13c3c8d3f1e380de149a6aedfff37-810x1080.jpg?w=432&h=576&q=80&fit=max&auto=format].
A group of protesters in Iran holding a placard on which the slogan "Long Live the Shah (King)" is sprayed).
Iranians in exile say few families have been spared by the brutal crackdown back home, describing to Iran International an unprecedented wave of killings as security forces unleash violence under a nationwide communications blackout.
For Alex, an Iranian living in Texas, the violence is no longer something he is witnessing from afar.
His cousin Mehdi was killed on Friday, January 9, in the western Iranian city of Kermanshah after joining nationwide protests following exiled Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi’s call for Iranians to rise up.
Iran International is withholding Alex’s last name to protect family members inside Iran.
“The Basij shot him in the head and the stomach," Alex said, recounting what his aunt told him. "They (Basij) hunted him like a dog."
Authorities later cut internet access across much of the country, severing communication and leaving families unable to confirm who was alive or dead.
Alex only learned what had happened days later, on Wednesday afternoon, when landlines briefly reopened during the blackout. The connection was poor and repeatedly cut out, but he could hear his aunt howling in tears and screaming.
"I only got like three minutes out of the call but what I got out of it was my aunt screaming and she said he's been killed."
Mehdi was 32 years old. Alex said his aunt later identified the body at a forensic center after days of searching. He says his aunt recognized her son by his hair.
"His face was completely unrecognizable," said Alex.
He said authorities are now demanding payment from the family to release Mehdi’s body.
From Texas, Alex said he feels hollow and barely able to function, but believes speaking publicly is the only way to honor his cousin and push back against the silence imposed by the blackout.
"He wanted a free Iran and King Reza Pahlavi."
'Fear and helplessness'
In Canada, Iranian-Canadian Ghazal Shokri described a similar sense of fear and helplessness as she waits for fragile contact with her family inside Iran. She said she has heard her mother’s voice only for seconds and her sister’s for minutes since the violence escalated.
Shokri said the scale of the killings is unlike anything Iranians have experienced before, warning that nearly every family now knows someone who has been killed.
She said she is increasingly worried not only about the physical destruction of the country but about the long-term psychological toll on Iranian society, including widespread trauma, depression and lasting social damage.
“There is every family now in Iran knows a few people got killed," Ghazal said.
"Honestly, it's not easy to talk about it. I mean, as a human being, we haven't been designed for this," she said.
Another Iranian in exile, Sobhan Nofar, said the nationwide communications blackout has intensified fear among Iranians living abroad.
“That silence is terrifying,” he said.
He said the loss of contact with people inside Iran has left many Iranians outside the country sleepless and consumed by anxiety for their families, with every fragment of information feeling like evidence of a growing bloodbath.
Hediyeh, a journalist based in Washington, DC, says she is worried not only about the health of her parents and her husband's family, but also about their financial situation, as they largely relied on allowances the couple sent through friends and relatives.
With the internet shut down, it is no longer possible to send money to the family, leaving Hediyeh concerned about how the elderly parents will make ends meet under Iran’s severe economic conditions.
Iran International has reported that at least 12,000 people were killed in just two days as security forces unleashed what analysts describe as the deadliest wave of state violence in the Islamic Republic’s history. Other estimates suggest the toll may be even higher as the blackout continues to limit verification.
Growing calls for US action
The testimonies come as calls by Iranians inside the country and across the diaspora for US military action have intensified, with demands for targeted strikes against the Islamic Republic’s security and repression apparatus.
For Iranians in exile like Alex, Shokri and Nofar, the debate is no longer abstract. It is shaped by the names and faces of people they knew and by the fear that more families will soon join them in mourning.
"Every piece of news, videos or photos coming from Iran feels like another sense of a blood bath," said Nofar "I'm really scared, deeply scared but I don't allow myself to completely fall apart because I truly believe Iranian people are bigger than this terrorist regime."
As Iran remains largely cut off from the outside world, they say speaking publicly is one of the few ways left to ensure the dead are not reduced to statistics.
[https://www.iranintl.com/en/202601178265 IranIntl]
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Detained protesters injected with unknown substances in Iran jail.
Iran International. Jan 18, 2026.
Protesters held in Iranian prisons have described abuse, including forced nudity, exposure to cold, and injections with substances of unknown composition while in custody, a source close to a detainee’s family told Iran International.
The source said a detained young protester sent a message from inside prison saying he and several others had been subjected to such treatment after their arrest.
According to the detainee, prison officers stripped detainees naked in the courtyard of the detention facility and kept them outside the building for a prolonged period in winter conditions. The officers then sprayed the detainees with cold water using a hose, the source said.
The detainee also said that the following day, prison officers injected him and several other prisoners with substances whose contents were not identified.
[https://www.iranintl.com/en/202601185741
IranIntl]
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Israel, US back Argentina’s Quds Force terror designation.
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar and the U.S. State Department hailed Buenos Aires’ move to list Iran’s Quds Force as a terrorist group, calling it a key step against Iranian terror.
JNS Staff.
(Jan. 18, 2026 / JNS)
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar and the U.S. State Department on Saturday welcomed Argentina’s decision to designate Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force as a terrorist organization, calling it an important step in combating Iranian-backed terrorism.
[https://www.jns.org/israel-us-back-argentinas-quds-terror-designation/ JNS]
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US ‘has no better friend’ than Israel, Graham says.
The senator’s meeting with Prime Minister Netanyahu came “at one of the most consequential moments in recent memory,” Lindsey Graham wrote.
JNS Staff
([https://me.jnsi.org/uploads/2026/01/G-8I7j3WkAANEf2-1320x880.jpeg].
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem, Jan. 18, 2026. Credit: Lindsey Graham/X).
(Jan. 18, 2026 / JNS)
The United States “has no better friend than the State of Israel,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said following a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Sunday.
In a post on X, the American lawmaker said the sit-down with the leader of the Jewish state was “great” and came “at one of the most consequential moments in recent memory.”
[https://www.jns.org/us-has-no-better-friend-than-israel-graham/ JNS]
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Mamdani asked to appoint head of Jew-hatred office who can engage with Jews.
“We Jews are all navigating these new conditions we’re facing,” a member of one of the groups that signed the letter told JNS.
Debra Nussbaum Cohen.
(Jan. 18, 2026 / JNS)
As concerns about Zohran Mamdani and the safety of Jews continue to run high among many Jewish New Yorkers, 13 groups sent a letter to the new mayor asking that he appoint someone who is “grounded in the day-to-day realities of Jewish communal life and capable of engaging meaningfully with communities across all levels of observance, background and political belief” to lead the Mayor’s Office to Combat Antisemitism.
The subtext of the letter? Please do not appoint an anti-Zionist, as Mamdani did with many of the Jews who were on his transition committees. The first Muslim to win the city’s top office, Mamdani has long been anti-Israel and has said that he would have Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu arrested if he visits the Big Apple.
[https://www.jns.org/mamdani-asked-to-appoint-head-of-jew-hatred-office-who-can-engage-with-jews/ JNS]
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The Horn Brothers' Chilling Account.
Two Years in the Dark: Freed Hostage Reveals the Details of Hamas’s Tunnel City.
After more than 700 days in the depths of Gaza, Eitan Horn reveals how the strength of the Israeli people kept him alive when the government and the world seemed to forget.
Author: Eliana Fleming.
Jan 18, 2026 20
[https://www.jfeed.com/news-israel/hamas-tunnel-hostage-testimony JFeed]
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The Shah’s Son Returns
Hijacking the Regime: Iranian State TV Hacked to Broadcast Calls for Revolution
In a daring act of cyber defiance, opposition hackers seized control of Iran’s state television to broadcast a message from the exiled son of the Shah, calling for the military to abandon the regime.
Eliana Fleming.
Jan 18, 2026
[https://www.jfeed.com/middleeast/iran-state-tv-hacked JFeed]
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'No longer safe'.
Trump weighs asylum plan for UK Jews amid rising antisemitism.
Israel National News.
Jan 18, 2026, 11:37 PM
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421099 INN]
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Four months in prison for Arab who spat at IDF officer.
Ahmad Muhammad, 25, from the PA city of Huwara, spat at an officer in uniform in Ramat Gan and fled the scene.
Israel National News.
Published: Jan 18, 2026, 10:01 PM (GMT+2)
The Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court on Thursday sentenced Ahmad Muhammad, 25, a resident of the Palestinian Authority city of Huwara, to four months in prison after he spat at an IDF officer while riding a public bus.
According to a report by Walla, Muhammad was convicted under a plea agreement on charges of assaulting an IDF officer and being illegally present in Israel. In delivering the sentence, the judge emphasized the seriousness of the offense, particularly as it occurred during a time of war.
The incident took place in May on bus line 161 in Ramat Gan. An IDF officer serving on active reserve duty, dressed in uniform, boarded the bus and sat near Muhammad. During the ride, Muhammad played music at a high volume, prompting the officer to move to another seat.
According to the amended indictment, to which Muhammad pleaded guilty, when the bus reached a stop he approached the officer from behind, leaned toward her, and spat in her face. As the bus doors opened, he fled the scene. Although the officer shouted after him, neither passengers nor the driver intervened. Muhammad returned to the Palestinian Authority but surrendered to authorities later that same evening...
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421095 INN]
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Iran warns Trump.
'Any attack on Khamenei is full-scale war'.
Iran warns that any attack on Khamenei would mean war, as the US weighs military action amid escalating tensions.
Elad Benari.
Jan 19, 2026, 1:14 AM
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421101 INN]
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'The nicest tunnel is here'.
Matan Angrest returns to the soccer pitch.
Israel National News.
Jan 18, 2026, 10:54 PM
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421096 INN]
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Despite drop in terror:
IDF reports rise in rock and firebomb attacks.
Yoni Kempinski.
Jan 19, 2026, 7:23 PM
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421145 INN]
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Netanyahu.
'Turkish and Qatari soldiers? Not in Gaza'
Israel National News.
Jan 19, 2026, 6:06 PM
[https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/421142 INN]
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IDF strikes Hezbollah terror assets in Lebanon.
The Israeli military said it attacked Hezbollah “military” camps.
JNS Staff.
(Jan. 19, 2026 / JNS)
The Israel Defense Forces said on Monday that it had attacked targets belonging to the Iranian-backed Hezbollah terror organization in Southern Lebanon.
In a statement, the Israeli military said it had struck Hezbollah “military” camps used to train terrorist operatives for planning and carrying out attacks against Israeli soldiers and civilians.
[https://www.jns.org/idf-strikes-hezbollah-terror-assets-in-lebanon-2/ JNS]
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