Today In Issues:
FDD Research & Analysis
The Must-Reads
World must pressure Hamas on Gaza deal, Netanyahu says after group's statement IDF declares Hamas’s Rafah Brigade defeated; no active cross-border tunnels found WINEP’s Ido Levy: Hamas is weakened, but a prolonged guerrilla conflict looms Charges coming in alleged Iranian hack-and-leak attack on Trump campaign Iran-linked hackers target Iraqi government in new campaign ISIS’ David Albright, Spencer Faragasso, and the Good ISIS Team: Renewed activity at the Sanjarian and Golab Dareh Amad sites Russian counteroffensive in Ukrainian-controlled Kursk begins, says Zelensky Hamas chief Sinwar thanks Hezbollah in letter to Nasrallah AEI’s Michael Rubin: Why India needs to consolidate its control in the western Indian Ocean North Korea shows first photos of banned uranium enrichment site WSJ Editorial: A warning to business in Hong Kong U.S. sanctions 16 Venezuelan regime figures for abetting election fraudIn The News
Israel
A top Israeli military intelligence official resigned on Thursday over his failure to prevent the Hamas-led attacks on Oct. 7, Israel’s military said. Yossi Sariel, the commander of Unit 8200, the Israeli military’s largest and most important intelligence unit, told his commanders that he would step down in the near future, the military said. – Wall Street Journal
The first phase of a large-scale polio vaccination campaign in Gaza is set to conclude on Thursday, with organizers hopeful of soon fulfilling their goal of inoculating 640,000 children under 10. – New York Times
Gaza’s economy has shrunk to less than a sixth of its size when the Israel-Hamas war began nearly a year ago, while unemployment in the occupied West Bank has nearly tripled, a U.N. report said on Thursday, underscoring the challenges of reconstruction. – Reuters
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that more pressure should be put on Hamas to accept a new Gaza deal proposal, after the Palestinian militant group said it was only willing to implement a ceasefire free of new conditions. – Reuters
The Israeli military on Thursday named nine men it said were Hamas militants killed in Gaza airstrikes that the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA said had left six of its staffers dead. – Reuters
The U.S. State Department has approved the potential sale of heavy-duty tank trailers and related equipment to Israel in a deal valued at $164.6 million, the Pentagon said on Thursday. – Reuters
The World Health Organisation said on Thursday it had carried out a rare evacuation of 97 people, around half of them children, from Gaza to the United Arab Emirates for medical treatment, and urged the resumption of regular such transfers. – Reuters
Four people were killed and eight injured when a vehicle exploded in the central Israeli city of Ramla on Thursday in an apparent gangland hit, medics and police said. – Agence France-Presse
The Knesset approved in its first reading a second additional budget for the fiscal year 2024, the Knesset plenum spokesperson announced on Thursday evening. – Jerusalem Post
On Thursday, the Government Press Office (GPO) announced that it would revoke the press credentials of Al Jazeera journalists operating in Israel, citing national security concerns. – Jerusalem Post
The Hamas terror group’s Rafah Brigade has been decimated, at least 2,308 of its operatives have been killed by the Israel Defense Forces, and over 13 kilometers (8 miles) worth of tunnels have been destroyed, military officials told reporters in the Gaza Strip’s southernmost city on Thursday. – Times of Israel
Elliot Kaufman writes: Ms. Harris treated the war only as a humanitarian crisis. Oct. 7 was horrible, Israel’s response was horrible, so end it now. Absent is any strategic objective. If the war ends now, Hamas will be left to rearm, restore its rule and start the next war. Hers is the same logic that has failed in each previous round of fighting. – Wall Street Journal
Mohamed Saad Khiralla writes: The examples I mention leave no doubt about the desire for peace of Israel’s political leaders and their efforts to achieve it through all possible means. What we are now reaping at the hands of Iran and its disruptive arms in the region (Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, Islamic Jihad, and similar groups) has roots and is not the result of coincidence. To move beyond our current situation toward a more humane and peaceful future, we must understand and openly discuss everything that has happened in the past without any redlines or restrictions of any kind. – Jerusalem Post
Ido Levy writes: So far, Israel appears to be the only actor willing to do the hard fighting that removing Hamas from power necessitates. Yet Israeli leaders may not have the political will to maintain this military pressure for much longer. Officials have already indicated that the IDF may revert to smaller raids on targets of opportunity, as with the March operation at al-Shifa Hospital. They have also ruled out implementing any Israeli governance mechanisms to challenge Hamas’s political dominance in Gaza. Accordingly, other actors—whether the United States and its allies, some coalition of Arab states, the Palestinian Authority, or a combination—will need to take on some of these burdens. – Washington Institute
Iran
Federal authorities are preparing to file criminal charges over Iran’s alleged hack and leak attack against Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, according to people familiar with the matter. – Washington Post
British authorities had done even more to protect Iran International, the London-based satellite news channel that airs the weekly program of the journalist, Pouria Zeraati, and has built an audience of millions in Iran despite being outlawed by the Islamic republic. – Washington Post
Iran’s foreign ministry summoned the heads of the British, French, German and Dutch embassies on Thursday, the Iranian judiciary’s Mizan news agency reported, following accusations of missile transfers to Russia and the imposition of new sanctions. – Reuters
Gunmen killed three border guards and wounded one other person Thursday in restive southeastern Iran, state-run media reported. – Associated Press
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian arrived Thursday in Iraqi Kurdistan to meet the autonomous region’s leaders, on the second day of a visit aimed at deepening ties with the neighboring country. – Agence France-Presse
A suspected Iranian state-sponsored threat actor has targeted Iraqi government organizations and other entities in the country as part of a new espionage campaign, researchers have found. – The Record
David Albright, Spencer Faragasso, and the Good ISIS Team write: It cannot be ruled out that Iran conducted some additional experiments inside the bunker, but there is no obvious external manifestation that such testing has occurred. […] Additionally, commercial satellite imagery only provides a momentary snapshot, and any visible activities may have occurred outside the window when the images were taken. With constant visual monitoring capabilities, advanced states may have seen much more. – Institute for Science and International Security
Russia & Ukraine
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced Thursday that Russia had launched a counteroffensive to take back the parts of its Kursk region occupied by Ukrainian forces last month. – Washington Post
Ukraine accused Russia on Thursday of using strategic bombers to strike a civilian grain vessel in a missile attack in Black Sea waters near NATO member Romania, escalating tensions between Moscow and the military alliance. – Reuters
President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that the West would be directly fighting with Russia if it allowed Ukraine to strike Russian territory with Western-made long-range missiles, a move he said would alter the nature and scope of the conflict. – Reuters
Russian shelling on Thursday killed three Ukrainians working for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and wounded two others in a village in the frontline Donetsk region, Ukrainian officials said. – Reuters
The Russian interior ministry has placed six foreign journalists on its wanted list for illegally crossing the Russian frontier to report inside the Kursk region after a Ukrainian cross-border incursion, the TASS news agency reported on Thursday. – Reuters
Three lawyers who once represented the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny went on trial Thursday in Russia, part of the Kremlin’s unrelenting crackdown on dissent that has reached levels unseen since Soviet times. – Associated Press
Elina Beketova writes: While the Ukrainian government is appealing to international organizations, such as the World Health Organization, to investigate medical care in Ukraine’s occupied territories and address the detention of medical workers, other bodies are focused on securing the release of captives. Only a coordinated approach involving sanctions, political pressure and diplomatic pressure will be effective, and the Kursk operation has given Ukraine more opportunities to capture prisoners of war for potential exchanges. – Center for European Policy Analysis
Hezbollah
Hamas chief Yehya Sinwar thanked the leader of Lebanon’s Hezbollah Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah for his group’s support in the conflict with Israel, Hezbollah said on Friday, in the first reported message since Sinwar became Hamas leader in August. – Reuters
The European Union’s top diplomat on Thursday urged Lebanon and Israel to work on deescalating tensions along the border, saying that since his last trip to the region in January “the drums of war have not stopped pounding.” – Associated Press
The IDF announced on Thursday that Israeli fighter jets attacked a military structure belonging to the Hezbollah terrorist organization in the Marun al-Ras area of southern Lebanon. – Jerusalem Post
The Hezbollah terror group fired some 20 rockets toward the northern city of Safed early Friday morning, sparking a large blaze in a nearby forest and causing minor damage to a building in another community, authorities said. – Times of Israel
Middle East & North Africa
The body of a Turkish American activist killed by Israeli gunfire was expected to arrive in Turkey on Friday for her funeral and burial in a town on the Aegean coast. – New York Times
Experts will this week resume a risky operation to salvage the Sounion tanker that was repeatedly attacked by Yemen’s Houthis in the Red Sea last month and still holds about one million barrels of crude oil, maritime sources said on Thursday. – Reuters
The UN Libya mission said on Thursday that Libyan factions did not reach a final agreement in the talks aimed at resolving the central bank crisis that has slashed oil output and exports. – Reuters
Tunisian coast guards recovered the bodies of five African women migrants and a baby in waters off the town of Monastir, a judge said on Thursday. – Reuters
The United Nations is cutting back its activities in Yemen in response to a crackdown by Houthi rebels on staff working for the U.N. and other humanitarian, human rights, development and education organizations, the top U.N. aid official said Thursday. – Associated Press
President Erdogan has reaffirmed the need for Russia to relinquish its hold on Crimea. At same time Ankara has rejected anew the reunification of Cyprus while repudiating a new defense roadmap agreement between Cyprus and Washington. – New York Sun
Saud Al-Sharafat writes: In contrast, how the Arab world and the Palestinian people will get rid of Hamas is a much thornier question. One essential step is the ability to openly criticize Hamas and address its position as a security threat to the state of Jordan. And even under the current situation, the Jordanian state also possesses sufficient strength, willpower, and experience to manage any attempts to cross red lines and create a state of security chaos in the country. – Washington Institute
Korean Peninsula
North Korea for the first time showed images of the centrifuges that produce fuel for its nuclear bombs on Friday, as leader Kim Jong Un visited a uranium enrichment facility and called for more weapons-grade material to boost the arsenal. – Reuters
South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol will visit the Czech Republic between September 19-22, his office said on Thursday. – Reuters
South Korea is painting a horrifying picture of human rights abuses in North Korea a decade after a United Nations study castigated the North for virtually every imaginable abuse ranging from murder and enslavement to rape and sexual violence to repression of speech and dissent. – New York Sun
China
The U.S. and Chinese militaries are taking tentative steps to re-engage diplomatically after a two-year freeze in relations, seeking to dial back the risk of confrontation while tensions simmer over Beijing’s activities in the South China Sea and its support of Russia. – Wall Street Journal
China’s defence minister said on Friday that China would enhance military ties with its neighbours, saying major countries had to take a lead in safeguarding global security. – Reuters
China’s President Xi Jinping on Thursday urged authorities to strive to achieve the country’s annual economic and social development goals, state media reported, amid expectations more steps are needed to bolster a flagging economic recovery. – Reuters
China’s Commerce Minister Wang Wentao will visit Europe in the coming days for discussions on the European Union’s anti-subsidy case against China-made electric vehicles (EVs) as a vote on imposing more EV tariffs looms. – Reuters
Chinese President Xi Jinping could meet his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskiy next month, a former Ukrainian official said in Beijing on Thursday at the opening of China’s biggest annual military diplomacy event. – Reuters
Chinese leader Xi Jinping will visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi confirmed Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. – Associated Press
Editorial: More people are waking up to the reality that Hong Kong no longer can be trusted to honor the rule of law. In addition to the State Department warning, on Tuesday the House overwhelmingly passed a bipartisan bill that requires the President to certify annually whether the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Offices in the U.S. should continue to enjoy diplomatic privileges and immunity. This is what happens when you erase distinctions between Hong Kong and China. Businesses have been warned. – Wall Street Journal
Collin Levy writes: The state says religious leaders must follow Mr. Xi’s “Two Establishes” and “Two Safeguards,” which require party members to acknowledge the general secretary as the “core” of the party and protect its total authority. Those who don’t are at risk, as Early Rain well knows. For now it stands as a witness against the state’s repression. Beijing is counting on its critics to blink, thanks to the compliance of a frightened population and the complacence of a distracted West. Will the U.S. prove it wrong? – Wall Street Journal
South Asia
Zahra Hussaini didn’t give up on her dream of becoming a doctor when a car bomb exploded outside a school near her home in Kabul in 2021, killing dozens of schoolgirls and sparking fears that her classrooms might be next. – Washington Post
India’s economic relationship with neighbour China has been very “unfair” and “imbalanced”, Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said on Thursday. – Reuters
India and China agreed to redouble efforts to ensure complete disengagement on the contested Himalayan frontier, New Delhi said on Thursday after India’s National Security Adviser Ajit Doval met China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Russia. – Reuters
About 45 Indian nationals have been discharged from the Russian army and efforts are under way to get a further 50 Indians released, a spokesperson for the Indian Foreign Ministry said on Thursday. – Reuters
Several people were killed and others injured in an attack by unknown armed individuals in Afghanistan on Thursday, the country’s Interior Ministry spokesman said, the first attack on civilians in Daykundi province since the Taliban took power. – Reuters
“Friendly” countries have helped Pakistan to meet requirements necessary to secure a bailout by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said on Thursday. – Reuters
When an uprising ousted Sri Lanka’s president, many saw it as the end of his powerful family’s hold on the island nation after more than 12 years of rule. – Associated Press
Michael Rubin writes: That need not be imperial or exploitative; if anything, India’s experience at the hands of the British and to lesser extent Dutch and Portuguese gives New Delhi a sensitivity the United States and China lack. Rather, creating a Pax Indica along Africa’s eastern coast could be symbiotic as African states could expand trade and preserve their sovereignty in the face of Chinese exploitation. India, meanwhile, could ensure that it enjoys a similar maritime buffer to that which allowed the United States to propel itself to superpower status. – FirstPost
Asia
The United States announced sanctions on Thursday on Cambodian businessman and ruling party senator Ly Yong Phat as well as several entities over alleged abuses related to workers who were trafficked and forced to work in online scam centers. – Reuters
Elon Musk, owner of social media platform X, on Friday called Australia’s centre-left government “fascists” over proposed legislation to slap fines on social media firms for failing to prevent the spread of misinformation online. – Reuters
Vietnam is considering resuming plans to develop nuclear power to ensure national energy security and to support economic growth, according to a government document reviewed by Reuters. – Reuters
Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra on Thursday outlined her government’s policy agenda to parliament, headlined by plans to give away 450 billion baht ($13.4 billion) in handouts to jumpstart Southeast Asia’s second-largest economy. – Reuters
Australia’s centre-left government on Thursday introduced new hate crime legislation that would impose criminal penalties including jail for offenders if they targeted a person’s race, gender, ethnic origin, religion or sexual orientation. – Reuters
Europe
When Prime Minister Robert Fico of Slovakia returned to work this summer after recovering from gunshot wounds from a May assassination attempt, he released a video message titled “I forgive and I warn.” – New York Times
The foreign ministers of several Muslim and European countries will meet in Madrid on Friday to discuss how to implement a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the Spanish and Norwegian governments said. – Reuters
Hungary is ready to sue the European Commission to reimburse the costs of protecting the European Union’s external border, which Budapest says has cost it some 2 billion euros ($2.20 billion), Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s chief of staff said. – Reuters
Poland added its voice on Thursday to calls to allow Ukraine to fire Western-supplied missiles deep into Russia as it hosted U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken for talks in Warsaw. – Reuters
The European Commission said on Thursday it had received offers from electric vehicle makers in China for minimum import prices into the European Union as a way of avoiding tariffs, but had rejected all of them. – Reuters
Lithuania’s main political forces have come together against the rise of a new party whose leader is on trial for anti-Semitic statements as the country heads into parliamentary elections next month. – Bloomberg
Several European Union nations intend to challenge International Monetary Fund chief Kristalina Georgieva about the Washington-based lender’s plan to engage with Russia on economic issues for the first time since the invasion of Ukraine. – Bloomberg
Editorial: Both need to increase defense spending while making those funds go much further. Both must stimulate higher levels of investment and encourage innovation even while grappling with aging populations and a backlash over immigration. Given the scale of these challenges, tweaks to trade rules may seem underwhelming. They’re still a big step in the right direction. – Bloomberg
Joseph C. Sternberg writes: The other lesson is that Europe must be warier of America’s willingness and ability to work with allies under either a Democratic or a Republican administration, given the isolationist temper of the times in the U.S. This will be good for no one in an ever more dangerous world, and may come to be viewed as the greatest of the many foreign-policy failures of the Biden-Harris era. – Wall Street Journal
Tom Rogan writes: Put simply, Xi bought off Sanchez just as he bought off Scholz and the fake Hungarian nationalist Viktor Orban. Xi has half the EU in his pocket and Putin has the EU divided. This leaves the EU unable to coordinate any serious response to China’s dumping campaign or to maintain significant support for Ukraine. Indeed, with its economic growth rates stagnant, its political leadership and popular opinion divided, and its adversaries plainly holding the initiative, the EU may well be in systemic decline. – Washington Examiner
Africa
The United States supports creating two permanent United Nations Security Council seats for African states and one seat to be rotated among small island developing states, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield announced on Thursday. – Reuters
Guinea Bissau’s President Umaro Cissoko Embalo said on Thursday he would not run for a second term in elections in November. – Reuters
Senegal President Bassirou Diomaye Faye on Thursday dissolved the opposition-led national assembly, clearing the way for early legislative elections on Nov. 17. – Reuters
The World Food Program needs better access to people at risk of starvation in Sudan and more money from the crisis-weary West to feed more than 25 million people facing acute hunger, the U.N. agency’s director said Thursday. – Associated Press
Conflict is likely among partners in South Africa’s new coalition government but that won’t be “catastrophic” for its hopes of turning around the country, the leader of the second biggest political party said Thursday. – Associated Press
The US is increasing humanitarian aid to South Sudan by $100 million to provide additional food for about one million people. – Bloomberg
The Americas
The U.S. leveled sanctions against 16 Venezuelan officials Thursday for allegedly helping strongman Nicolás Maduro steal the July presidential elections and launching a crackdown that forced the opposition leader Edmundo González to flee the country last Saturday. – Wall Street Journal
The Venezuelan government has called on its ambassador to Spain as well as Spain’s ambassador to the Latin American nation, Venezuela’s foreign minister said on Thursday, ramping up a diplomatic feud. – Reuters
El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele will visit Buenos Aires in late September and meet his Argentine counterpart Javier Milei, an Argentine government source told Reuters on Thursday. – Reuters
The International Monetary Fund’s director of the Western Hemisphere Rodrigo Valdes has fully delegated all negotiations with Argentina to other officials, the fund said on Thursday. – Reuters
Two dozen soldiers and police officers from Jamaica arrived in Haiti on Thursday to join a U.N.-backed mission led by Kenya to fight powerful gangs. – Associated Press
United States
With only four months left in the Biden administration and little hope of Congress approving additional funding for Ukraine no matter who wins the presidency, the White House is debating how best to help Kyiv given its limited toolbox. – Wall Street Journal
The U.S. House of Representatives narrowly voted on Thursday to approve legislation to tighten rules limiting Chinese content in vehicles qualifying for U.S. electric vehicle tax credits. – Reuters
The U.S. State Department on Thursday imposed sanctions on a Chinese research institute and several companies it said have been involved in supplying Pakistan’s ballistic missile program. – Reuters
U.S. President Joe Biden will host a Quad leaders summit with leaders from Australia, India and Japan on September 21 in Delaware, the White House said on Thursday. – Reuters
Russia, Iran and China are “ramping up” attempts to stoke divisions within the US ahead of November’s presidential election, according to a top Department of Justice official. – Bloomberg
A senior US official warned that Chinese companies are increasingly involved in boosting Russia’s war economy as President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to unite European allies on the issue. – Bloomberg
Editorial: Yet as Trump noted, three days after her “diplomacy,” Russia invaded. Regardless of November’s results, Ukraine would be in a far stronger negotiating position based on gains it could make if restrictions on long-range weapons are rolled back. Harris and Biden need to shed their cowardly fear of responding to Russian escalation and heed the calls to provide serious help to Ukraine. – New York Post
James Bacon writes: The cold war against China has gotten dangerous. In this atmosphere, mutually beneficial economic cooperation would be a good first step toward easing tensions, and a great way to one-up the Biden-Harris administration in the contest over who will deliver for the American economy. With his pragmatic approach to China, Trump is uniquely positioned to pull off the “Art of the Deal.” – The Hill
Cybersecurity
As tropical storm Bebinca barrels towards waters off northern Taiwan gathering strength into a possible typhoon, weather forecasters in Taipei are using a new and so far successful method to help track its path – artificial intelligence (AI). – Reuters
A newly released congressional examination found that China placed various technological backdoors, such as modems, into ship-to-shore cranes that could give access to the machines. – The Record
Three judges appointed to Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal by the country’s ousted Law and Justice (PiS) party have blocked an inquiry into that party’s alleged abuse of Pegasus spyware to target political opponents. – The Record
Defense
The U.S. Army has picked Anduril Industries and Performance Drone Works to provide Small Uncrewed Aircraft Systems, or SUAS, to Army units as part of an effort to buy capability fast and get it into soldiers’ hands as the service races to modernize its force. – Defense News
Maritime and aerial spats in the South China Sea between China and the Philippines, Washington’s oldest treaty ally in the Indo-Pacific, will be a key talking point in high-level meetings between the U.S. Department of Defense and their Chinese counterparts. – USNI News
Antiquated information technology and modern capabilities are colliding at the Defense Department, where officials are using artificial intelligence to try to make old-timey software code more user-friendly for IT modernization. – DefenseScoop