WHAT DOES PRESIDENT BIDEN THINK?

For starters, I have seen this with my own eyes. I didn’t just hear about it on TV or read on the internet.

A year ago, prior to October 7th, I was in northern Isreal on the border with Lebanon. I was shown and walked 140 feet down into the most sophisticated tunnel from Lebanon into Isreal you can imagine - lights, ventilation, tracks for transportation , phones etc. It was dug by Hezbollah with only one purpose - to slip into Israel unnoticed and then to kill innocent Israelis. There was no other purposed.

A few months later, right after October 7th, I was back in Israel. This time, after the slaughter. I walked the Be-eri Kibbutz. Everywhere I looked there was dried blood, and bullet holes in walls. Every home was burned in the Kibbutz where about 1000 people had lived. There are no words described the feelings walking by the homes knowing that parents and children were burned alive. I also walked past a destroyed ambulance. First responders, knowing the danger of what was going on, arrived to help the hurt and were likewise slaughtered by Hamas.

Walking the concert ground where young people were slaughtered was different. I had seen the videos of the young people fleeing as Hamas slaughtered many of them, but by the time I got to the grounds, it had been cleaned up but its vastness and emptiness and its then peacefulness was haunting.

I also watched the October 7th video of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Qatar. He was laughing and cheering the slaughter as it was happening. By the way, he became a billionaire stealing money meant for the Palestinians in Gaza given over the years by UNRWA - which of course was supported very generously by US taxpayers.

A month or so later, after returning to Washington DC, I learned that the IDF had an approximated 47 minute video that they had compiled from the go pro cameras Hamas wore as they videotaped their unthinkable acts. The video was not going to be distributed out of respect for the families slaughtered. I thought it important that I see it (with my own eyes) so that I could better report on the atrocities of Hamas.

I contacted the Israeli Embassy in Washington and they made arrangements for me to see the video. I sat in a small dark room at the Embassy with a few hours in silence as we watched 47 minutes of cruelty. I will space you all the details of what I watched Hamas do in real time, but suffice it to say it included killing parents in front of children, children in front of parents, rape, and even decapitation - and the decapitation was very slow to no doubt make it all the more cruel (if possible) as Hamas cheered. In one part of the video, a Hamas could be heard calling his mother all excited and laughing and bragging that he killed (10?) just by himself and without the help of other Hamas. This is Hamas.

Back on 9/11, I worked at CNN. I had seen the video of people desperately jumping from about 80 floors up from the burning World Trade Center. CNN did not broadcast the graphic video out of decency and respect for the person’s family and our audience. As I watched the video in our newsroom, I thought I could never and would never see anything worse. This was Al Qaeda.

A few years later, I was at the Fox News channel. I watched in our newsroom the graphic video of American journalist James Foley. He was decapitated in a desert in Syria. His proud killers videotaped the decapitation and released most of the video to news organizations. Fox, like CNN, did not broadcast the graphic video out of decency and respect for Jim Foley’s family and our audience. This was ISIL.

At the time of the Jim Foley decapitation, I thought I had never seen worse and would never see worse. For some reason this video seemed worse than people desperately jumping out of the World Trade Center windows but I think that is because 13 years had passed and the video of Jim Foley was a close up and not many floors and blocks away. But I also thought - how peculiar for me to be comparing atrocities - how do you compare atrocities? You can’t.

And now to the present time.

Despite all I have seen - from 9/11 to Jim Foley and all in between, and all the wars I have covered (Afghanistan, Iraq, Ukraine) and all the countries where the governments do unthinkable things to its citizens (eg Sudan and North Korea, where I have been 3 times), I am back to comparing atrocities and nothing is worse than Oct 7 and continues now with the execution of the 6 hostages - shot in the back of the head after being held (tortured) for more than 200 days.

And the world’s response? They are now blaming Israel. Maybe these people - including politicians and those collecting on our streets protesting with hateful signs - should go see it for themselves (like I did.)

I was shocked that President Biden said on camera after the recent execution of 6 that Prime Minister Netanyahu is not doing enough. He said that Netanyahu should ‘do more.’ Like what? Do what? Tell me exactly what he can do? On behalf of Israel, Netanyahu has accepted the recent ceasefire brokered deals but Hamas refuses.

And no one should be surprised by Hamas’ refusal to accept a ceasefire. All you have to do is something very basic: read the Hamas Covenant of 1988 (their charter.) It spells out in very plain language its mission and intent: destroy Israel, never negotiation and Jihad is the only answer.