Audio Version:Israel and the Neighbor Who Wants You DeadThe wolf at the door, part three: notes from the Israeli frontierHow should a decent person act toward a neighbor who has announced, repeatedly and in writing, that he intends to kill you and take your land? A neighbor who has both the means and the apparent intent to carry out that threat. How should an entire sovereign nation act when confronted with the same dilemma?There is no simple, clean answer. No textbook of political ethics where you can look it up. No Wikipedia page to consult. Most of what gets written about this problem, from either direction, is an attempt to make it stop being hard. It does not stop being hard. Our intuitions and our laws are remarkably reliable at the scale of one man and his neighbor. They begin to fail somewhere on the way up to the scale of a sovereign state.This question stopped being theoretical for me during our recent journey through Israel, Judea and Samaria, and the communities bordering Gaza. We stood in homes where families had been murdered. We spoke with people who survived October 7. We looked across fences into territory governed by an organization whose founding charter openly called for Israel’s destruction, and whose leaders have repeatedly reaffirmed that objective in one form or another. I came home realizing that the moral framework I instinctively carried with me was built for disputes between individuals, not for nations living beside neighbors committed to their elimination.That realization became the seed for this essay. It is not an argument for one government or another, nor an attempt to justify every action taken in war. It is an attempt to answer a question that has haunted me since returning home:What does a nation do when the wolf is continually at the door?Thanks for reading Malone News! This post is public so feel free to share it.ShareOne Man and His NeighborSuppose the man across the fence has told you he intends to kill you and take your farm. He has already tried once. Now he is raising his sons to finish the job.Anglo-American law is clearer here than most people expect, and more restrictive than instinct might suggest. You may use deadly force against an imminent threat, andimminentmeans now, not someday. You may use force proportionate to the threat, and no more. In many jurisdictions, you must retreat if you can do so safely, though generally not from your own home (American Law Institute 1962, sec. 3.04; LaFave 2017, sec. 10.4).The law does not permit the rest. You may not kill him today because of what he said last year. You may not kill his sons because of what they have been taught. You may not burn his house to make an example for the rest of the county. A threat may be genuine and terrifying, but if it is not imminent, preemptive killing is not self-defense. The law calls it murder.All of this assumes a sheriff. It assumes that if you call, someone comes. It assumes the man who kills you will be arrested by a third party with no stake in the quarrel. Every constraint described above is acceptable because that third party, the law backed by the lawman, exists.Take away the sheriff and the structure begins to collapse. Richard Maxwell Brown traced how American law gradually diverged from English law on precisely this point, abandoning much of the duty to retreat during the nineteenth century in a society where the nearest lawman might be days away (Brown 1991). Remove the enforcer, and the standard of imminence becomes increasingly difficult to apply. By the time the threat is unmistakably imminent, no one is coming to help.There is no sheriff above sovereign states. America is its own sheriff. Israel is its own sheriff. So is China. The difference is that Israel's nearest existential threats are measured in miles rather than oceans. That is the first thing an American must absorb, and it is harder than it sounds because we have lived for generations under the protection of one. We mistake it for the natural order. It is not. Looking back to the American frontier reminds us that it was not always so here. It is certainly not so on Israel’s frontier.To the extent that a supranational sheriff exists, it would presumably be the United Nations. A sheriff, however, is expected to enforce the law impartially. The UN Human Rights Council has long been criticized for doing the opposite. Resolution 5/1, adopted in 2007, created Agenda Item 7, devoted exclusively to “the human rights situation in Palestine and other occupied Arab territories.” It remains the Council’s only permanent country-specific agenda item.Every regular session must include debate on Israel, while every other country in the world is considered only under general procedures or special resolutions (United Nations Human Rights Council 2007). Whatever one thinks of Israeli policy, the existence of a permanent docket for one nation and one nation alone is difficult to reconcile with the notion of an impartial referee. Israel is the only member state with a permanent agenda item requiring discussion at every regular session of the Human Rights Council. No other country, regardless of its conduct, is subject to the same standing requirement. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said as much the day after its adoption, expressing disappointment that the Council had singled out one regional situation despite serious allegations elsewhere in the world (United Nations 2007).Nor does the institutional structure exist in a political vacuum. In the General Assembly, the 57-memberOrganization of Islamic Cooperationfrequently coordinates positions on resolutions involving Israel. It is often joined by many members of the 53-nation African Group, together with other developing countries and regional allies. The result is not a permanent voting bloc, nor unanimity, but a coalition that often commands comfortable majorities on Israel-related resolutions. In that environment, many do not view the United Nations as a neutral sheriff standing above the dispute, but as a political institution in which outcomes are shaped by enduring diplomatic coalitions as much as by legal principle.When One Man Becomes a Nation: The Limits of Individual MoralityReinhold Niebuhr confronted this problem almost a century ago. InMoral Man and Immoral Society(1932), he argued that the moral standards available to individuals cannot simply be scaled to groups. Nations must exercise power, yet the greatest danger is not merely the misuse of power but convincing themselves that whatever they do is therefore righteous.The threat stops being episodic. A man may come at you on Tuesday, and by Wednesday the danger has passed. A hostile population or political administration is a standing condition rather than an event.Apply the doctrine of imminence, which allows deadly force only when the threat is immediate rather than merely anticipated, to a permanent threat, and it ceases to distinguish one day from the next. Is the danger real? Yes. Is an attack underway at this moment? Usually not. A rule that gives the same answer every day cannot tell a government when it should act.The adversary stops being a person. He becomes a population containing combatants, sympathizers, the indifferent, the coerced, and a great many children. Proportionality is calculable against one man. Against a society, it becomes an estimate about people who have done nothing.The decision binds people who did not make it. A man who chooses to fight accepts the consequences for himself. A government sends other people's sons into battle and shapes the world their grandchildren will inherit.Individual self-defense law recognizes one important exception. A man is generally expected to retreat if he safely can, but not from his own home. The law recognizes that there comes a point where retreat means surrendering the very thing being defended. Nations eventually reach the same point.And the sheriff is absent. Or worse, the sheriff consists of foreign governments whose willingness to intervene rises and falls with elections, headlines, alliances, and conflicts of interest.Niebuhr's conclusion was not that nations are free to ignore morality. It was almost the opposite. A nation under existential threat must sometimes choose between bad options, but it should never pretend that choosing one of them makes it innocent.The Name for the Hard CasePolitical philosopher Michael Walzer confronted perhaps the hardest question in the ethics of war: what should a nation do when following the ordinary rules of war appears likely to bring about its own destruction? He called this the problem ofsupreme emergency(Walzer 1977, 251-268).A supreme emergency is not ordinary war. It is the circumstance in which a political community faces not defeat but extinction. Walzer insisted the exception be narrowly confined. The threat must be genuine, imminent, and existential rather than merely severe. The measures taken must be necessary rather than merely useful. And even then, necessity does not transform a wrong into a right. The wrongdoing leaves what Walzer called amoral residue.Walzer takes it seriously and constrains it. The threat must be imminent and genuinely existential rather than merely severe. The measure must be necessary rather than useful. And the wrong done does not stop being wrong because it was necessary. He called this fact of war -the moral residue.His principal example was Britain's carpet bombing of Germany. In 1940, Britain stood alone. A German invasion seemed entirely possible, and the country faced a genuine risk of defeat. Walzer believed those circumstances qualified as a supreme emergency. By 1942, however, the strategic situation had changed. Germany was still dangerous, but Britain was no longer fighting for its immediate survival. The bombing continued anyway. Walzer's point was not that Britain had acted in an emergency. It was that it failed to recognize when the emergency had ended.Walzer's argument leaves no comfortable refuge. Governments cannot invoke existential danger indefinitely. Every extraordinary measure demands continual re-examination. But critics have no easy escape either. If they reject the claim that a nation faces an existential threat, they must say what evidence would persuade them otherwise. Moral seriousness requires both disciplines. That question is no longer theoretical. It is the question Israel has been forced to answer since its founding.What Rome Did, and What it AccomplishedOne fact is often overlooked in modern discussions of Israel. The Jewish connection to this land is not merely a matter of religion or modern politics. It is a historical relationship that has already survived one of history’s greatest attempts at erasure.The Roman Empire had done this before. After three wars spanning more than a century, Rome destroyed Carthage in 146 BC. The city burned for seventeen days. Many survivors were sold into slavery, and the site itself was symbolically cursed (Polybius 38.19-38.22; Appian,Punica127-132). Contrary to popular legend, the Romans did not salt the earth. No contemporary source records such an act. Instead, they eventually returned, rebuilding Carthage as a Roman colony because its location was simply too valuable to abandon (Ridley 1986; Miles 2010, 363-373).Jerusalem proved to be a different kind of problem.Following the Bar Kokhba revolt in AD 132-135, Emperor Hadrian attempted something far more ambitious than military conquest. Jerusalem was leveled and rebuilt as the Roman city of Aelia Capitolina. Jews were barred from entering on pain of death. The province of Judaea was renamed Syria Palaestina (Cassius Dio 69.12-69.14; Eck 1999). Whether intended primarily as punishment or administrative reorganization, the effect was unmistakable: to sever the historic connection between the Jewish people and their ancestral homeland.It did not work.The Roman campaigns devastated Judea and dispersed much of the Jewish population across the empire. But they did not empty the land of Jews. Jewish communities remained continuously in places such as Jerusalem, Galilee, Tiberias, Safed, and Hebron through Byzantine, Islamic, Crusader, Mamluk, and Ottoman rule. The diaspora became the larger story, but it was never the only story.Nor had Rome understood what it was trying to destroy.The destruction of the Second Temple in AD 70 had already forced Judaism to adapt. Under figures such as Yohanan ben Zakkai, Jewish religious life shifted from a system centered on one temple, one priesthood, and one place to one centered on Torah, law, and study (Neusner 1970; Cohen 1987, 214-231). Rome could destroy buildings. It could not destroy a civilization that no longer depended upon them. What appeared to be a fatal blow instead accelerated the transformation that made Judaism portable and remarkably durable.Nearly two thousand years later, the Roman Empire exists only in books and archaeological ruins. The Jewish people, despite exile, persecution, and repeated attempts at elimination, reestablished a sovereign state in the very land from which Rome had tried to erase them. The strongest historical argument against annihilation as a political strategy belongs to the Jews, and it was purchased at a price that no people would willingly pay.The name Hadrian imposed also endured.Syria Palaestinabecame the root from which the modern termPalestineeventually developed. Hadrian did not invent the word. Herodotus had usedPalaistinecenturies earlier to describe the Philistine coastal region (Herodotus 7.89). What Rome did was extend that name across the Jewish heartland. Through Byzantine administration, ArabicFilastin, Ottoman governance, and finally the British Mandate, the name survived long after the empire that imposed it had disappeared.History is full of peoples who vanished after conquest. The Jewish people are remarkable not because they escaped conquest, but because they did not disappear. They maintained both a continuous presence in the land and an enduring attachment to it across nearly two millennia. That history does not resolve the modern political conflict, but it explains why so many Israelis reject the suggestion that they should simply go somewhere else. From their perspective, history demonstrates that they have already tried leaving once. It lasted almost two thousand years.Diodotus, and the Argument That is Not About MercyIn 427 BC, Athens had voted to execute every adult male in the rebellious city of Mytilene and enslave the women and children. A ship left with the order. Overnight the assembly reconsidered, and Thucydides gives us both speeches (Thucydides 3.36 to 3.50).The influential Athenian politician, Cleon, argued for the killing. His case was deterrence. Anything less than maximum severity invites the next rebellion, and mercy toward enemies is cruelty toward your own citizens who will die in the next war.Another Athenian statesman, Diodotus answered him and refused to argue from compassion. He said so explicitly, because in that assembly a moral appeal would have been fatal to his case. His argument was practical. Annihilating a defeated enemy removes any incentive to surrender. If rebellion and surrender carry the same penalty, every future city fights to the last man, and Athens will pay for its severity in Athenian lives.Athens reversed itself. A second ship rowed through the night and arrived in time.The argument survives because it does not depend on the goodness of the person making it. A policy of no quarter converts every subsequent enemy into one with nothing to lose. That is a claim about arithmetic, and it is available to people who are not feeling generous.This history lesson does not tell Israel what to do. It tells Israel what to ask. What incentives will today's decisions create for tomorrow's enemies? A nation that ignores that question may win the present war while making the next one more likely. A nation that answers it badly may invite the very destruction it hopes to avoid.Gibeah, and the Argument Nobody MadeThe Hebrew Bible puts the same question to a different assembly, and that one does not reconsider.A Levite, one of Israel's religious officials, was traveling with a woman who was legally his concubine, a recognized secondary wife under the customs of the time, and stopped overnight in Gibeah, a town belonging to the tribe of Benjamin. Men of the city surround the house, the woman is pushed out to them, and she is raped through the night and dies at the threshold. The Levite cuts her body into twelve pieces and sends one to each tribe (Judges 19).Israel assembles and demands that Benjamin surrender the men of Gibeah. Benjamin refuses and musters to defend them. Two battles go badly for Israel. The third is won by feigned retreat and ambush, and what follows is not a battle. The towns of Benjamin are put to the sword, the people and the livestock together. Six hundred men escape to the rock of Rimmon (Judges 20).No Diodotus stood up in that assembly. There was no second ship.The morning after is worse. Israel looks at what it has done and says that one tribe is cut off from Israel today, and then sets about undoing it by means worse than the crime that started it. Having sworn to give no daughter to Benjamin, they destroy Jabesh-Gilead for failing to attend the assembly and spare four hundred virgins, then instruct the remaining two hundred men to abduct girls dancing at the festival at Shiloh (Judges 21).Athens found a Diodotus before it was too late. Israel did not. The near destruction of Benjamin is the result.The Bible does not celebrate what happened. It condemns it. Later generations of Jewish readers did not point to the destruction of Benjamin as a model to follow, but as a warning about what happens when justice gives way to vengeance. The prophets would later invoke “the days of Gibeah” as shorthand for national moral failure, not national righteousness (Hosea 9:9; 10:9). Rabbinic commentators were equally uneasy. Some observed that Israel mobilized an entire nation to avenge a terrible crime committed against one household while paying comparatively little attention to the deeper moral decay, idolatry, and lawlessness that had already spread throughout the nation. They had become zealous about punishment while losing sight of justice itself.The Book of Judges drives the lesson home with a refrain repeated four times, including its final sentence:“In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.”The point is not simply the absence of a monarch. It is the absence of a trusted authority capable of restraining violence before it consumed everyone involved.A crime committed by a handful of men ended with the near destruction of an entire tribe. That warning is nearly three thousand years old, and it forms part of the moral tradition that Israel inherited long before the modern state existed.The Middle Path, and its AuthorNot every existential struggle ends with annihilation or surrender. During the Cold War, American diplomat and historian George Kennan proposed a third path.Writing in 1946 and 1947, Kennan argued that Soviet hostility was not primarily a response to Western policy. It arose from the nature of the Soviet regime itself. The Kremlin needed an external enemy to justify its dictatorship, so no concession by the West could permanently satisfy it (Kennan 1947). If the hostility was structural rather than negotiable, then neither appeasement nor total war offered a solution.Kennan’s answer was containment.The idea was deceptively simple. Do not try to destroy the Soviet Union. Do not expect to persuade it. Instead, prevent its expansion wherever it threatens to spread, apply sustained political and economic pressure, strengthen the societies around it, and allow the regime’s own internal contradictions to weaken it over time.Kennan imagined this might take ten or fifteen years. It took nearly forty-five.At first glance, the doctrine seems to fit modern Iran remarkably well. Iran is a functioning state with an economy, governing institutions, and a ruling elite whose legitimacy depends upon maintaining power. Those are precisely the kinds of regimes containment was designed to outlast.Israel’s situation is different.The difference is geography.The United States could afford strategic patience because it had two oceans and thousands of miles separating it from the Soviet Union. If one crisis was mishandled, America would survive to confront the next. Israel does not possess that luxury. A country scarcely wider than New Jersey, with hostile forces only a few miles from major population centers, cannot easily absorb even one catastrophic failure. A doctrine whose success required forty-five years is a far more difficult proposition for a nation that must survive every Saturday morning in the meantime.Kennan himself later warned that many Americans had misunderstood his doctrine. He believed policymakers, particularly Paul Nitze, had reduced containment to military confrontation while neglecting the political, economic, and cultural tools that were meant to do most of the work (Kennan 1967, 354-367; Gaddis 2005, 87-124). The Marshall Plan, educational exchanges, broadcasting through Radio Free Europe, and patient diplomatic pressure were not supporting efforts. They were the strategy. Military strength existed primarily to buy time.The Helsinki Accords demonstrated why Kennan believed those instruments mattered.In 1975, thirty-five nations signed the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe. The agreement appeared to favor Moscow. The Soviet Union received long-sought Western recognition of Europe’s postwar borders, effectively acknowledging its domination of Eastern Europe. In return, the West obtained commitments on human rights, freedom of movement, family reunification, and the free flow of information, provisions that came to be known collectively as “Basket Three.”Many Americans regarded the agreement as a capitulation.Almost nobody in America thought this was a good trade, and most regarded the agreement as a capitulation. The Wall Street Journal ran an editorial against it. Ronald Reagan said it put an American stamp of approval on Russia’s enslavement of the captive nations. Senator Henry Jackson called the agreement one-sided. White House mail on the subject ran better than fifteen to one against (Snyder 2010).Critics argued that the United States had traded moral principle for diplomatic convenience. President Gerald Ford signed it anyway.The unexpected consequences emerged inside the Soviet bloc.Because the Soviet government celebrated the agreement as a diplomatic triumph, it published the text for its own citizens. Dissidents suddenly possessed something they had never before enjoyed: an official document, signed by their own government, promising rights that the government itself routinely violated.The character of dissent changed overnight. Citizens were no longer demanding revolutionary change. They were demanding that their governments honor commitments they had already made. Yuri Orlov founded the Moscow Helsinki Group to monitor Soviet compliance. Charter 77 emerged in Czechoslovakia. Helsinki Watch was founded in the United States and later became Human Rights Watch. Poland’s Solidarity movement followed. International review conferences repeatedly forced Soviet officials to answer for promises they had voluntarily made. As historian Daniel Thomas argues, provisions that many diplomats dismissed as symbolic gradually became one of the legal and moral foundations of the movements that helped bring the Soviet system to an end (Thomas 2001).The mechanism was surprisingly simple. The strategy worked because the Soviet Union had willingly signed the document.Israel has no equivalent instrument aimed at Palestinian society, and there is a structural reason it cannot easily have one. There is no agreement capable of creating the same dynamic within Palestinian society because any comparable effort would immediately be dismissed as an instrument imposed by Israel itself. That may be the hardest problem in this entire conflict. Containment succeeded in the USSR because it encouraged change from within. Israel has struggled to find an equivalent path, and I do not know what one would look like.Why the Germany Analogy Almost Never AppliesModern discussions of Gaza often reach reflexively for Germany or Japan after the Second World War. The comparison is understandable. It is also usually incomplete.Germany and Japan are among the few modern examples in which populations immersed for years in expansionist or eliminationist ideologies were successfully reoriented toward peaceful democratic societies. But those transformations followed extraordinary circumstances: total military defeat, unconditional surrender, years of foreign occupation, complete political reconstruction, and populations exhausted by catastrophic war (Dower 1999; Jarausch 2006). Rwanda after 1994 offers another example, although one achieved under an authoritarian government that continues to exact a significant price in political freedom (Straus and Waldorf 2011).Those conditions are rarely available.Israel cannot realistically occupy Gaza for a decade at an acceptable cost in lives, resources, international support, or domestic cohesion. Nor can it simply rewrite a society’s educational system without becoming the object of the very resentment it hopes to overcome. Whoever controls the schools inevitably inherits the legitimacy problem.History offers other examples of governments choosing overwhelming military force instead.Sri Lanka destroyed the LTTE in 2009. The insurgency ended, but only after a campaign that the United Nations Panel of Experts estimated killed tens of thousands of civilians and that generated credible allegations of war crimes against both sides (United Nations 2011). France won the Battle of Algiers through systematic torture, later acknowledged by General Paul Aussaresses himself, yet ultimately lost Algeria while inflicting lasting damage on the moral authority of the French Republic (Aussaresses 2002; Horne 1977).The historical lesson is not that force never succeeds. It plainly can. The lesson is that military victory alone rarely resolves the political problem that produced the conflict in the first place. Germany and Japan are remembered because military victory was followed by something far more difficult: years of reconstruction, institutional transformation, and the gradual rebuilding of political legitimacy. Those conditions are precisely what make the analogy so difficult to apply to Gaza today.What Game Theory Can Tell Us, and What It CannotPolitical scientists and economists have spent decades trying to understand why wars continue when peace would seem to benefit everyone. Their conclusions are often uncomfortable because they undermine many of the slogans heard in public debate.James Fearon transformed the field in 1995 with a simple observation. War is extraordinarily costly. If both sides truly preferred peace, some bargain should almost always exist that would leave each better off than continued fighting. The real question, then, is not why peace is desirable, but why bargaining fails (Fearon 1995).Fearon argued that it usually fails for three reasons. One side hides its true intentions or capabilities. Neither side believes the other’s promises about the future. Or the thing being fought over is viewed as indivisible. Later scholars, particularly Robert Powell, argued that the last problem is often really the second. Even if both sides prefer peace today, neither can trust the other not to exploit a shift in power tomorrow (Powell 2006).That insight lies behind many modern conflicts. The central question is often not whether today’s agreement is acceptable, but whether either side believes it will still be honored five years from now.Robert Jervis added another layer to the problem. He argued that policymakers repeatedly make one of two opposite mistakes. They assume an adversary is inherently aggressive when it is actually acting from fear, or they assume an adversary is merely frightened when it is in fact committed to expansion. The two situations often produce the same observable behavior, yet they demand opposite responses (Jervis 1976; 1978).History remembers both mistakes. The 1938 Munich Agreement, in which Britain and France accepted Hitler's annexation of part of Czechoslovakia in the hope of preserving peace, is usually remembered as the danger of mistaking aggression for insecurity.The outbreak of the First World War is often cited as the opposite error, where mutual fear and miscalculation produced a catastrophe that few leaders actually wanted.That question sits at the heart of Israel’s predicament. Does Hamas seek limited political objectives, or is its commitment to Israel’s destruction genuine? Does Iran seek deterrence, regional influence, or something more fundamental? Game theory cannot answer those questions. It can only show that everything depends upon getting the diagnosis right.Robert Axelrod’s famous tournaments reached another surprising conclusion. Cooperation usually emerges not from kindness but from repeated interaction. The most successful strategies were neither relentlessly aggressive nor endlessly forgiving. They were initially cooperative, responded firmly to betrayal, forgave genuine cooperation, and made their behavior predictable (Axelrod 1984).But that strategy contains an assumption that is often overlooked. It works only if both sides value the future enough for future rewards and punishments to matter. If one side embraces martyrdom, believes history is nearing its end, or simply discounts tomorrow far more heavily than today, then the incentives that normally sustain cooperation begin to disappear. Managing the conflict may become more realistic than resolving it.Thomas Schelling extended the same logic to deterrence. A threat that no one believes is no threat at all. For deterrence to work, commitments must be visible, credible, and difficult to reverse (Schelling 1960). That uncomfortable reality explains why nations often adopt positions they hope never to carry out. The purpose is not to fight, but to convince others that they will if forced.Game theory, however, has one profound limitation. It accepts people’s goals as given. It can model how rational actors pursue their objectives, but it cannot tell us what those objectives actually are. It cannot determine whether Hamas is fundamentally committed to Israel’s destruction or whether its goals are ultimately negotiable. Nor can it account for the competing factions, personalities, and political pressures that shape decision-making on both sides.In the end, game theory explains why this conflict is so difficult. It does not tell us how to solve it.Who can sign, and who survives signingPolitical scientist Barbara Walter asked a deceptively simple question: why do civil wars end in negotiated settlements so much less often than wars between states?Her answer was that the problem is structural rather than personal. In a civil war, the side that disarms first makes itself vulnerable. No trusted authority exists to enforce the agreement. Even if both parties negotiate honestly and in good faith, neither can safely take the first step because there is no sheriff to guarantee that the other side will keep its promises. Third-party guarantees are often the only variable that changes the outcome (Walter 2002).That is the structure of today’s debate over Gaza. Hamas refuses to disarm before Israel withdraws. Israel refuses to withdraw before Hamas disarms. Whether any outside power can credibly guarantee either promise becomes the central question.There is a second problem, and an American example illustrates it better than any Middle Eastern one.The Treaty of New Echota, which authorized the removal of the Cherokee people from their ancestral lands, was signed in December 1835 by roughly one hundred Cherokees, none of whom held office in the Cherokee government. John Ross, the elected Principal Chief, submitted a petition opposing the treaty bearing approximately fifteen thousand signatures from a nation of only sixteen thousand people. The United States Senate ratified the treaty by a single vote. Four years later, three of its principal signers were assassinated by fellow Cherokees under a Cherokee law that made unauthorized land cessions a capital offense (Perdue and Green 2007, 69-116; Wilkins 1986).The treaty was legally valid. It never possessed the political legitimacy needed to survive.The same pattern appears repeatedly in the modern Middle East.King Abdullah I founded the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and ruled it from independence. He also conducted quiet negotiations with Zionist leaders before and after Israel’s creation in 1948 and was widely believed to be pursuing a separate accommodation with the new Jewish state. In July 1951, while entering Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque for Friday prayers, he was assassinated by a Palestinian gunman. Standing beside him was his fifteen-year-old grandson, the future King Hussein, who survived the attack (Shlaim 2007, 1-40).Anwar Sadat launched Egypt into the 1973 war against Israel. Four years later, he stunned the world by flying to Jerusalem to address the Knesset. In 1979 he signed the peace treaty that returned the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt and permanently removed his country from the Arab-Israeli wars. The Arab League expelled Egypt in response. Two years later, while reviewing a military parade commemorating the very war he had begun, Sadat was murdered by officers from his own army because he had made peace with Israel (Kepel 2003, 191-218).Yitzhak Rabin commanded Israel's army during the Six-Day War of 1967. As Prime Minister, he signed the Oslo Accords and shook Yasser Arafat's hand on the White House lawn. The Oslo process ultimately collapsed, ushering in years of renewed violence and leaving unresolved the interim arrangements in the West Bank. The division of the territory into Areas A, B, and C, intended as a temporary framework pending a final settlement, became the political and legal hellscape that still defines the conflict today. Rabin never lived to see that outcome. In November 1995, after leaving a peace rally in Tel Aviv, he was assassinated by Yigal Amir, an Israeli law student who believed religious law justified the killing (Ephron 2015). The square where he fell now bears his name.None of these leaders was killed by the enemy. Each was killed by someone from his own side. Each possessed the military credentials necessary to make peace, and in each case those same credentials could not protect him from those who believed peace itself was betrayal.Political scientists Andrew Kydd and Barbara Walter explain why this pattern repeats itself. Extremists attack precisely when peace appears possible. Their objective is not simply to kill. It is to destroy trust. Every successful attack convinces each side that the other either cannot or will not control its own extremists, causing negotiations to collapse under the weight of renewed suspicion (Kydd and Walter 2002).Peace requires more than a willing partner. It requires a partner who can survive making peace. Those are not the same thing. Under exactly the conditions where peace is most desperately needed, they often become mutually exclusive. Anyone who explains the repeated collapse of negotiations solely as a product of bad faith is overlooking a structural reality that has claimed the lives of kings, presidents, and prime ministers.Assimilation is Not a Security StrategyThe Cherokee Nation conducted an experiment that bears directly on Jewish history.In the early nineteenth century, the Cherokee adopted many of the institutions of the young American republic with remarkable speed. Sequoyah developed a written syllabary in 1821, and within a few years literacy became widespread. The Cherokee adopted a written constitution in 1827 modeled on that of the United States, established a bilingual newspaper in 1828, embraced settled agriculture, founded churches, and, in some households, even adopted the slaveholding practices of their Southern neighbors (Perdue and Green 2007, 8-40). By every standard the surrounding society claimed to admire, they had become legible, civilized, educated, and familiar.It made no difference.Gold was discovered on Cherokee land in 1829. Congress passed the Indian Removal Act the following year. The Cherokee challenged Georgia in the United States Supreme Court and won. InWorcester v. Georgia(1832), the Court held that Georgia had no authority over Cherokee territory. It was one of the most significant victories an Indigenous nation ever achieved in an American court.The ruling changed nothing.President Andrew Jackson refused to enforce it. Georgia ignored it. Within a few years, the United States Army began forcing approximately 16,000 Cherokee men, women, and children from their homes. Escorted west at gunpoint over the winter of 1838-39, they walked nearly 1,000 miles to what is now Oklahoma. Disease, exposure, hunger, and exhaustion killed an estimated 4,000 people. The Cherokee remember it simply asThe Trail Where They Cried. Americans know it as the Trail of Tears.The lesson was brutal. Assimilation did not resolve a competing claim to the land. Legal victory did not protect them when no government was willing to enforce its own judgment. A right without an enforcer proved to be only words on paper.Many Jewish thinkers reached a remarkably similar conclusion in nineteenth-century Europe.Leon Pinsker reached that conclusion after the anti-Jewish pogroms that swept the Russian Empire in 1881-82. Theodor Herzl reached it after witnessing the Dreyfus Affair in France, where a decorated Jewish army officer could be publicly humiliated despite the ideals of the French Republic (Pinsker 1882; Herzl 1896). Germany provided perhaps the strongest test of all. By the early twentieth century, German Jews were among the most educated, patriotic, professionally successful, and culturally assimilated Jewish communities in Europe. Many regarded themselves as Germans first and Jews second. Their assimilation did not protect them. After Hitler came to power in 1933, Germany progressed from legal discrimination to exclusion, dispossession, deportation, and ultimately the Holocaust. Approximately six million Jews were murdered in what the Nazi regime called the Final Solution (Elon 2002).The comparison is not that the histories are identical. They are not. It is that two very different peoples reached the same unsettling conclusion. Becoming accepted by the surrounding society did not guarantee security when the conflict ultimately centered on sovereignty, identity, or land.That realization became one of the intellectual foundations of political Zionism. It also explains something that many outsiders struggle to understand. For many Israelis, the lesson of history is not that coexistence is impossible. It is that coexistence, by itself, has never been enough to guarantee survival.The Strongest Case Against Israel’s PositionAny honest examination of this question has to grapple with the strongest argument on the other side.Its serious advocates do not begin with antisemitism or Hamas. They begin with statelessness. Their claim is that the conflict is fundamentally driven by dispossession, military occupation, and the absence of Palestinian self-government rather than by inherited hatred. In this view, the Palestine eliminationist rhetoric is largely a consequence of those conditions rather than their cause (Khalidi 2020). A population that has lived for generations without a sovereign state, while much of the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) remains under Israeli military administration and subject to restrictions on movement and security, will predictably produce violent resistance. From this perspective, Hamas is not the origin of the conflict but one of its products.The argument follows naturally. Security measures adopted by Israel to contain violence deepen Palestinian resentment, which in turn produces more violence, prompting still more security measures. This is Robert Jervis’s spiral model in practice.Critics also point to developments in the West Bank. Israeli governments have continued to approve or expand Jewish settlements under administrations that have increasingly rejected the creation of a Palestinian state. To many observers, this appears less like a temporary security policy than a long-term territorial strategy. They also point to the enormous human cost of the Gaza war. Whatever disputes exist over the precise composition of the casualty figures, the scale of civilian suffering is undeniable.Critics further argue that Israel has not consistently restrained violence committed by its own citizens. Israeli police opened 779 investigative files in 2025 involving alleged offenses by Israeli civilians against Palestinians in the West Bank, compared with 139 in 2019, yet indictments were filed in only 6.6 percent of those cases (Haaretz 2026). Critics see this as evidence of inadequate enforcement. Israeli authorities respond that many investigations fail because of insufficient evidence or because witnesses are unwilling or unable to testify.Some of the most difficult questions come from within Israel itself.Israeli governments knowingly permitted large transfers of Qatari money into Gaza for years, believing that a Hamas responsible for governing two million people would become more pragmatic and easier to deter. That judgment is now widely regarded within Israel as a profound strategic mistake (Pfeffer 2023).Likewise, the history of the peace process remains genuinely contested. Many Israelis view the failure of the 2000 Camp David summit as proof that Yasser Arafat rejected an unprecedented opportunity for peace. Others, including American negotiator Robert Malley, argue that the Israeli proposal was less comprehensive than later public narratives suggested and that the subsequent negotiations at Taba came significantly closer to an agreement (Malley and Agha 2001).There is also no single Israeli view of the ethics of war. Some of the sharpest criticisms of Israeli military doctrine have come from Israeli scholars themselves. Asa Kasher and Amos Yadlin argued that a democratic state bears a heightened obligation to protect its own soldiers, even when that increases risk to enemy civilians in territory beyond its control (Kasher and Yadlin 2005). Michael Walzer and Avishai Margalit responded that this reverses a longstanding moral principle of warfare by shifting excessive risk onto noncombatants rather than onto combatants (Margalit and Walzer 2009).None of these arguments can simply be dismissed. They represent the strongest moral and strategic challenge to Israel’s view of the conflict. Any serious attempt to understand the problem has to answer them rather than caricature them.The Strongest Case for Israel’s PositionThe strongest argument for Israel begins with a simple proposition: intentions matter.Much of the public debate focuses on borders, settlements, and military operations. Israel’s defenders argue that these questions, while important, cannot be understood apart from the stated objectives of the organizations and governments confronting the Jewish state.The documentary record is difficult to dismiss. The original 1988 Hamas Charter explicitly called for the destruction of Israel, invoked anti-Jewish conspiracy theories includingThe Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and framed the conflict not simply as a territorial dispute but as a religious struggle against Jews (Hamas 1988, arts. 7, 22, 32). In 2017 Hamas issued a revised political document that adopted more pragmatic language and accepted a Palestinian state on the 1967 lines as an interim stage. Hamas leaders, however, stated at the time that the new document did not replace the original covenant (Hamas 2017, arts. 20, 27).Nor is Hamas alone. For decades, senior Iranian officials have repeatedly called for the elimination of the Israeli state while Iran has financed, armed, and trained multiple proxy organizations operating on Israel’s borders, including Hamas and Hezbollah (Levitt 2013; U.S. Department of State 2024). Qatar, meanwhile, hosted Hamas’s political leadership for years, illustrating how the movement has been sustained not only by local support but also by regional patrons.For many, if not most, Israelis, October 7 changed the argument permanently.Hostile rhetoric has always been abundant in the Middle East, and Israelis themselves often learned to discount it. Before October 7, many assumed that Hamas’s governing responsibilities, economic interests, and desire to remain in power would ultimately constrain its behavior. That assumption became known inside Israel asHaConceptziaor “the Conception.” October 7 destroyed that notion. The question was no longer whether Hamas intended mass violence. It had demonstrated both the intent and the willingness to carry it out.Israelis also point to a longer-term concern that extends beyond today’s battlefield.Multiple independent reviews of Palestinian educational materials, including studies by IMPACT-se and by the Georg Eckert Institute commissioned by the European Commission, found content that glorified violence, honored “martyrs,” or denied Israel’s legitimacy (IMPACT-se 2021; Georg Eckert Institute 2021). Whatever one’s view of those debates, one proposition is difficult to escape: the education of children shapes the politics of the next generation. No security arrangement is likely to outlast the beliefs of the people expected to sustain it.Finally, there is a strategic reality that underlies every Israeli calculation.The Holocaust also changed the arithmetic. During the Second World War, approximately one-third of the world's Jewish population was murdered. Today, there are only about sixteen million Jews worldwide, and roughly half live in Israel. For many Israelis, another national catastrophe is not simply another military defeat. It would threaten a substantial portion of the world's remaining Jewish population. Israel can afford very few catastrophic mistakes. Its adversaries need succeed only once. A country roughly the size of New Jersey, with major population centers only a few miles from hostile territory, cannot absorb repeated failures in the way larger nations can. That asymmetry shapes Israeli decision-making as profoundly as any ideology or political theory.Whether one ultimately agrees with Israel’s conclusions or not, these are the realities that many Israelis believe any serious analysis must first explain before proposing an alternative course.What History SuggestsHistory offers no resolution. It does, however, leave us with a handful of conclusions that survive comparison across very different times and places.The first lesson is that what I have called a "total solution", the attempt to permanently eliminate a people or the problem they represent, works against states far more often than it works against peoples. Rome's destruction of Carthage in 146 BC is often cited as the classic example. It ended Rome's centuries-long rivalry with the Carthaginian state. Carthage ceased to exist as an independent power, and over time the Punic people, descendants of the Phoenician settlers who had built the city, were absorbed into the wider Roman world. The Jewish experience followed a very different path. Rome destroyed Jerusalem, scattered much of the Jewish population, and even attempted to erase the land's Jewish identity by renaming the provinceSyria Palaestina. Yet the Jewish people endured because their identity no longer depended upon a single city or a sovereign state. It had become portable across time and place. Anyone reasoning from Carthage to a modern people is reasoning from the wrong historical example.The second lesson is that the instrument of a total solution is almost never the enemy's army alone. It is the civilian society that sustains it. Rome destroyed and enslaved the civilian population of Carthage. On the American plains, the United States encouraged the destruction of the great buffalo herds because they were the economic foundation of the Plains tribes (Isenberg 2000; Hämäläinen 2008). There is no version of a total solution that confines itself to combatants. Choosing such a strategy is also choosing to wage war against the society that supports them.The third lesson is that restraint is not the same as passivity. Choosing not to wage total war does not mean choosing inaction. History suggests that the most successful campaigns against insurgencies rely less on overwhelming force than on patient intelligence gathering, infiltration of hostile networks, targeted operations, financial disruption, and persistent deterrence. Those approaches are slower and often less emotionally satisfying, but they have generally proved more durable.Northern Ireland illustrates the point. Britain’s greatest strategic mistakes were not failures of military strength but failures of restraint. Internment without trial in 1971 and the killing of unarmed civilians on Bloody Sunday in 1972 became two of the Provisional IRA’s most effective recruiting tools, strengthening the very movement they were intended to suppress (English 2003, 134-152). Intelligence penetration of the IRA, by contrast, ultimately proved far more consequential than indiscriminate force.And a society under permanent siege has to defend its own institutions from its own security apparatus. South Korea lived beside an adversary committed to its absorption and took thirty-four years to get out from under the authoritarianism the threat justified (Cumings 1997, 337 to 393). That is the danger Niebuhr named, and it arrives from the inside.Scipio Aemilianus, the Roman general who commanded the destruction of Carthage in 146 BC, watched the city burn and began to weep. Standing beside him was the Greek historian Polybius, who asked why a victorious commander would mourn his greatest triumph. Scipio replied that he was thinking of Rome itself and of the day another conqueror might one day do the same to his own city (Polybius 38.21-38.22).The man carrying out the annihilation understood something his contemporaries often forgot. Every precedent created in war becomes a precedent available to someone else.Israel's dilemma is not a simple choice between decency and survival. It is that the response which feels most proportionate to the horror of an attack is often the one most likely to strengthen the forces that produced it. Conversely, history suggests that the most successful long-term strategies rely on relentless intelligence, credible deterrence, carefully targeted force, and the discipline to resist measures that satisfy today's anger while making tomorrow's war more likely. The hardest decisions in statecraft are rarely choices between good and evil. More often they are choices between what feels emotionally satisfying today and what is most likely to produce a safer tomorrow.One further complication receives too little attention. Incentives do not operate only at the level of governments. Decades of prisoner exchanges have demonstrated that hostages possess enormous strategic value. The 2011 exchange of more than one thousand prisoners for Gilad Shalit established a precedent that October 7 sought to exploit on a vastly larger scale. Once hostages become a reliable currency, future kidnappings become more, not less, likely. Any lasting settlement must therefore solve not only the political conflict but the incentive structure that has repeatedly rewarded hostage-taking.I do not know how a nation lives in that position for eighty years without distorting its own moral compass. Watching Israelis do it, up close, for a week, I came away with more respect for the attempt than I expected and less confidence that I would be able to manage the tension myself.RWM/JGMIf you made it this far, thank you.Essays like this take a lot of time to research, read, write, and fact-check. They are also increasingly uncommon. The internet rewards certainty, outrage, and slogans. It rarely rewards taking a difficult question seriously enough to admit that history offers hard lessons instead of easy answers.That is the kind of work I want Malone News to continue doing.If you find value in essays that dig beneath the headlines, challenge assumptions on every side, and try to understand problems before prescribing solutions, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. Paid subscriptions make this work possible. They give us the time to read the books, examine the original sources, travel to the places where history happened, and write without chasing clicks or algorithms.Subscribe nowThank you for reading, for thinking with me, and for helping make independent scholarship like this possible.ReferencesAmerican Law Institute. 1962.Model Penal Code, sec. 3.04. Philadelphia: American Law Institute.Amit, Yairah. 1999.The Book of Judges: The Art of Editing. Leiden: Brill.Appian.The Punic Wars. Translated by Horace White. Loeb Classical Library.Arreguin-Toft, Ivan. 2001. “How the Weak Win Wars: A Theory of Asymmetric Conflict.”International Security26 (1): 93 to 128.Aumann, Robert J. 2006. “War and Peace.”Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences103 (46): 17075 to 17078.Aussaresses, Paul. 2002.The Battle of the Casbah: Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism in Algeria, 1955 to 1957. New York: Enigma Books.Axelrod, Robert. 1984.The Evolution of Cooperation. New York: Basic Books.Axelrod, Robert, and Douglas Dion. 1988. “The Further Evolution of Cooperation.”Science242 (4884): 1385 to 1390.Brown, Richard Maxwell. 1991.No Duty to Retreat: Violence and Values in American History and Society. New York: Oxford University Press.Cassius Dio.Roman History, books 69 to 70. Loeb Classical Library.Cohen, Shaye J. D. 1987.From the Maccabees to the Mishnah. Philadelphia: Westminster Press.Cumings, Bruce. 1997.Korea’s Place in the Sun: A Modern History. New York: W. W. Norton.Dower, John W. 1999.Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II. New York: W. W. Norton.Eck, Werner. 1999. “The Bar Kokhba Revolt: The Roman Point of View.”Journal of Roman Studies89: 76 to 89.Elon, Amos. 2002.The Pity of It All: A History of Jews in Germany, 1743 to 1933. New York: Metropolitan Books.Ephron, Dan. 2015.Killing a King: The Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin and the Remaking of Israel. New York: W. W. Norton.English, Richard. 2003.Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA. London: Macmillan.Fearon, James D. 1995. “Rationalist Explanations for War.”International Organization49 (3): 379 to 414.Gaddis, John Lewis. 2005.Strategies of Containment: A Critical Appraisal of American National Security Policy during the Cold War. Rev. ed. New York: Oxford University Press.Georg Eckert Institute. 2021.Report on Palestinian Textbooks. Commissioned by the European Commission. Braunschweig.Haaretz. 2026. “Jewish Nationalist Crime in West Bank Up by 560 Percent Since 2019, Police Data Shows.” July 8.Hamalainen, Pekka. 2008.The Comanche Empire. New Haven: Yale University Press.Hamas. 1988.The Covenant of the Islamic Resistance Movement. Gaza.Hamas. 2017.A Document of General Principles and Policies. Doha.Hebrew Bible. Judges 19 to 21; Hosea 9:9, 10:9. Jewish Publication Society translation.Herodotus.The Histories. Translated by Aubrey de Selincourt. London: Penguin.Herzl, Theodor. 1896.Der Judenstaat. Vienna: M. Breitenstein.Horne, Alistair. 1977.A Savage War of Peace: Algeria 1954 to 1962. London: Macmillan.IMPACT-se. 2021.Review of Palestinian Authority Textbooks. Ramat Gan.Isenberg, Andrew C. 2000.The Destruction of the Bison: An Environmental History, 1750 to 1920. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Jarausch, Konrad H. 2006.After Hitler: Recivilizing Germans, 1945 to 1995. New York: Oxford University Press.Jervis, Robert. 1976.Perception and Misperception in International Politics. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Jervis, Robert. 1978. “Cooperation Under the Security Dilemma.”World Politics30 (2): 167 to 214.Kasher, Asa, and Amos Yadlin. 2005. “Military Ethics of Fighting Terror: An Israeli Perspective.”Journal of Military Ethics4 (1): 3 to 32.Kavka, Gregory S. 1978. “Some Paradoxes of Deterrence.”Journal of Philosophy75 (6): 285 to 302.Kennan, George F. 1947. “The Sources of Soviet Conduct.”Foreign Affairs25 (4): 566 to 582.Kennan, George F. 1967.Memoirs, 1925 to 1950. Boston: Little, Brown.Kepel, Gilles. 2003.Muslim Extremism in Egypt: The Prophet and Pharaoh. Berkeley: University of California Press.Khalidi, Rashid. 1997.Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness. New York: Columbia University Press.Khalidi, Rashid. 2020.The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine. New York: Metropolitan Books.Kiernan, Ben. 2007.Blood and Soil: A World History of Genocide and Extermination from Sparta to Darfur. New Haven: Yale University Press.Kydd, Andrew, and Barbara F. Walter. 2002. “Sabotaging the Peace: The Politics of Extremist Violence.”International Organization56 (2): 263 to 296.LaFave, Wayne R. 2017.Criminal Law. 6th ed. St. Paul: West Academic.Levitt, Matthew. 2013.Hezbollah: The Global Footprint of Lebanon’s Party of God. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.Malley, Robert, and Hussein Agha. 2001. “Camp David: The Tragedy of Errors.”New York Review of Books, August 9.Margalit, Avishai, and Michael Walzer. 2009. “Israel: Civilians and Combatants.”New York Review of Books, May 14.Miles, Richard. 2010.Carthage Must Be Destroyed: The Rise and Fall of an Ancient Civilization. London: Allen Lane.Neusner, Jacob. 1970.A Life of Yohanan ben Zakkai. 2nd ed. Leiden: Brill.Niebuhr, Reinhold. 1932.Moral Man and Immoral Society: A Study in Ethics and Politics. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.Perdue, Theda, and Michael D. Green. 2007.The Cherokee Nation and the Trail of Tears. New York: Viking.Pfeffer, Anshel. 2023. “How Netanyahu’s Hamas Policy Came Back to Haunt Him.”Haaretz, October 20.Pinsker, Leon. 1882.Auto-Emancipation. Berlin.Polybius.The Histories, books 38 to 39. Loeb Classical Library.Powell, Robert. 2006. “War as a Commitment Problem.”International Organization60 (1): 169 to 203.Ridley, R. T. 1986. “To Be Taken with a Pinch of Salt: The Destruction of Carthage.”Classical Philology81 (2): 140 to 146.Schelling, Thomas C. 1960.The Strategy of Conflict. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Shlaim, Avi. 2007.Lion of Jordan: The Life of King Hussein in War and Peace. London: Allen Lane.Snyder, Sarah B. 2010. “Jerry, Don’t Go: Domestic Opposition to the 1975 Helsinki Final Act.”Journal of American Studies44 (1): 67 to 81.Straus, Scott, and Lars Waldorf, eds. 2011.Remaking Rwanda: State Building and Human Rights after Mass Violence. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.Thomas, Daniel C. 2001.The Helsinki Effect: International Norms, Human Rights, and the Demise of Communism. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Thucydides.History of the Peloponnesian War, book 3. Translated by Rex Warner. London: Penguin.United Nations. 2007.Statement Attributable to the Spokesperson for the Secretary-General on the Human Rights Council. New York, June 20.United Nations. 2011.Report of the Secretary-General’s Panel of Experts on Accountability in Sri Lanka. New York.United Nations Human Rights Council. 2007.Institution-Building of the United Nations Human Rights Council. Resolution 5/1, June 18. Geneva.U.S. Department of State. 2024.Country Reports on Terrorism. Washington, DC.Walter, Barbara F. 2002.Committing to Peace: The Successful Settlement of Civil Wars. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Walzer, Michael. 1977.Just and Unjust Wars: A Moral Argument with Historical Illustrations. New York: Basic Books.Wilkins, Thurman. 1986.Cherokee Tragedy: The Ridge Family and the Decimation of a People. 2nd ed. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.Worcester v. Georgia, 31 U.S. (6 Pet.) 515 (1832).


Postscript: The Microphone Under Charlie Kirk's Shirt

I always read and reflect on reader comments, and though time doesn’t allow me to comment on most of them, I alwaysthinkabout them.I would like to take a few minutes to respond to some of the comments on my post today (The Microphone Under Charlie Kirk’s Shirt).For months I have refrained from commenting on the “microphone theory”— despite my awareness of it — because I have perceived it to be too speculative.The only reason why I commented on it today was because several readers requested that I state my opinion about it.For over twenty years I have studied and written about remarkable violent crimes that have struck me as inadequately explained by the authorities. In all these cases, the authorities made representations about the crimes that struck me as incongruous with the observable elements of the crimes.On the face of it, the murder of Charlie Kirk, and the official explanation of it, strike me as very odd. This has prompted me to ask questions that should—it seems to me—be asked by the accused’s defense attorneys.And so I presented these questions in my post today. IF there are plausible answers to these questions, then let them be answered in court. The whole point of a trial is examine the evidence that the accused is guilty of committing the crime and also to evaluate circumstances and facts that may be exculpating or point to a different culprit. We the People have an interest in maintaining the correct judicial process, even if we believe in the guilt of the accused before the trial is conducted.I’ll conclude by offering an account of how I view public affairs as a citizen of the United States, and as an author who investigates the increasingly strange and disordered public life of this Republic.1). I do NOT blindly trust the men who occupy positions of federal and state authorities to tell us the truth aboutanything. I don’t care what the particular subject matter happens to be, or the political party of the politician or agent who is making the representations.2). If federal and state authorities make representations that square with my knowledge and perception of reality, I won’t waste my time questioning them. However, if they make statements that strike me as implausible, Iwillquestion their assertions.3). Though I believe I am a good citizen and am grateful to be an American, my primary interest isin ascertaining and reporting reality, NOT in maintaining an affiliation or protecting the interests of a political party, region, fraternity, club, or religious congregation.4). I am an individualist and therefore regard all group identities and interest groups with the suspicion that they do reliably act for the common good, but more often in  the interest of their group.5). I prefer to be alone than to conform to the pressures of a group or tribal identity.Subscribe nowShare

Summary: Responding to reader comments


RFK: "Lyme Disease Almost Certainly Came from These [Gain-of Function] Experiments"

On July 28, 2026, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced a government-wide policy of ending federal funding for dangerous gain-of-function (DGOF) research.A few readers—including a couple of angry readers—have asked me to explain why Kennedy just stated on Fox News that Lyme disease “almost certainty came from these [Gain-of-Function] experiments.”Some readers may recall that, last November, in a conversation on the PBD Podcast, FDA Commissioner Marty Makary stated that “with a high degree of probability,” Lyme disease came from the U.S. biodefense “Lab 257 on Plum Island just outside of Connecticut.”Makary elaborated that the pathogenic agent was developed primarily by the German veterinarian and animal virus specialist, Dr. Erich Traub, who previously conducted biological warfare research for Nazi Germany and was brought to the United States after the war as part of Operation Paperclip to acquire German scientific research while denying it to the Soviets.Dr. Erich TraubAs evidence, Makary cited the published literature on the U.S. bioweapons program to develop insects and arachnids as disease vectors. He specifically mentioned the book,Bitten: The Secret History of Lyme Disease and Biological Weapons,by Kris Newby.I was already familiar with the theory that the causative agent of Lyme disease—a spiral-shaped bacteria (spirochetes) from the Borrelia genus, primarilyBorrelia burgdorferi—came out of Lab 257 on Plum Island. The bacteria was first isolated and described in 1982 by Wilhelm Burgdorfer, a Swiss-American medical entomologist who worked at NIAID.The first cluster of Lyme disease cases in humans was identified in 1975 in Old Lyme, Connecticut, after two mothers noticed their children's unusual arthritis symptoms.I hadn’t given this theory much thought until I saw the reflexive, widespread, and lockstep proclamations that Dr. Makary’s statement is a “debunked conspiracy theory.”Whenever I hear loud cries that a statement is a “conspiracy theory!” I am inclined to believe that he who is making the statement is on target. He may not know all of the particulars, and he may be wrong about certain details, but he is likely barking up the right tree.Surveying the literature on the internet and doing an AI search yields afeeble“debunking” of this “conspiracy theory”—namely, that afterBorrelia burgdorferiwas isolated in 1982, researchers found evidence that the bacteria had been circulating for thousands of years in animals and humans.This argument is so childish and flimsy that only a hack propagandist would write it.To assert that the bacteria was around long before Dr. Erich Traub served as a consultant at the U.S. biodefense lab on Plum Island in the 1950sin no way debunks the theory.The bacteria readily infects lab monkeys, especially rhesus macaques, which develop symptoms similar to humans, including arthritis, carditis, and neurological issues.It is therefore a perfectly plausible theory that Traub et al. conductedserial passage experimentsofBorrelia burgdorferion rhesus macaques to make it more virulent to primates.This is consistent with the OspC type A genotype ofBorrelia burgdorferibeing linked to more severe inflammation and arthritis in Lyme disease cases. This isthe genotype that is prevalent in the Northeast, starting around Connecticut, characterized by specific, conserved amino acid sequences in its variable loop regions, making it a key marker for pathogenic strains.The entire biodefense industry justifies the billions of dollars it receives from the US government by claiming that nature—or specific human habitations in the world such as China—are constantly producing new bacteria and viruses against which the human organism is defenseless.Infectious diseases posed an enormous problem for human civilization between 1347 and 1900—a period of rapid global exploration, trade, population growth and urbanization accompanied by appalling hygienic conditions and nutrition among the urban poor. However, living standards in the modern, industrialized nations of the West are not comparable to those that prevailed prior to 1900.\Consider that London—the largest and wealthiest country in the world during the 19th century—didn’t even have a functioning sewer system until the 1880s.Because nature isn’t producing the pathogens that are the justification of the Bio-Pharmaceutical Complex and its bloated funding, biodefense/bioweapons lab scientists and vaccine developers have been obliged to create pathogens such asvirulentBorrelia burgdorferi, human transmissible H5N1, and SARS-CoV-2.Author’s Note: If you found this post interesting and informative, please become a paid Subscriber to our newsletter. For just $5.00 per month, you can help us to make a living at the business of researching and reporting the nefarious activities of creepy lab scientists, many of whom will ignore Secretary Kennedy’s prohibition of their research.Subscribe nowShare

Summary: Reviewing the evidence that Lyme disease emerged from US biodefense Lab 257 on Plum Island


The Microphone Under Charlie Kirk's T-Shirt

Several readers of my post yesterday (Medical Examiner’s Wonky Conduct in Tyler Robinson Trial)have asked me what I think of the theory that Charlie Kirk’s fatal neck wound was inflicted by the microphone or some other audio recording device that appears to be fixed to the upper left side (facing Kirk) of Kirk’s chest.I was already familiar with the theory that it wasthis devicethat inflicted Kirk’s fatal neck wound.Upon hearing this theory, I naturally thought of the exploding pagers that were clandestinely deployed on Hezbollah agents on September 17-18, 2024.Benjamin Netanyahu seems to have alluded to these exploding pagers when he gifted President Trump agold-plated pageron February 4, 2025.In this incident, the pager batteries were packed with six grams of military grade high explosive that created a high energy blast, killing or maiming the Hezbollah agents who wore the pagers and anyone else who happened to be around them at the time they exploded.Initially, it seemed to me that, IF Charlie Kirk was equipped with a similar exploding device, it would have produced an explosive blast radiating from the device. IF it were equipped with a lens device to direct the blast, it would—it seemed to me—injure the chest area to which the device was fixed, andnotproduce the wound that appears on Kirk’s neck.Nevertheless, my reader comments yesterday prompted me to examine this theory and my initial assumptions about it.Coincidentally, last night I got a last-minute invitation to join an old friend for dinner who happens to be a collector of all kinds of military grade weapons.“Youshouldtake a closer look at the microphone,” he advised me. “I too think it looks pretty weird.”This morning I asked a professional audio and video technician to look at a video of Charlie Kirk being shot.He made the following observations:1). There appears to be an unusually bulky device fixed to the left side (facing Charlie) of his upper chest.2). It seems odd that this device appears to be fixed — probably taped to his chest —on the left sideand angling up in a diagonal direction instead of being fixed in the middle of his chest in vertical position, with the microphone receiver directly under his mouth.3). Advancing the video frame by frame, the first thing that moves is thet-shirt, which seems to billow upbeforethe wound on the neck appears.To see what the audio-video technician is referring to, watch the video below. Place it in full screen mode and advance the timer frame by frame.CAUTION: The video is very upsetting to watch, soviewer discretionis strongly advised.From working with forensic scientists on my previous books, I have learned to beextremely cautiousin my interpretations of photo, video, and audio recordings. Thus, I want to emphasize that I am NOT drawing any conclusions from watching this video.However, reviewing this video prompts me to formulate the followingtheorythatshouldbe carefully evaluated by Tyler Robinson’s defense attorneys. I will pose the theory in the form of the following questions.Question 1: Is it possible that the purported audio-recording device fixed to Kirk’s upper chest was fashioned into agun-like devicethat could fire a small projectile a few inches with enough velocity to pierce the carotid artery and jugular vein on the right side (facing Kirk) of his neck?Question 2: Can the prosecutorrule outthis possibility? If so, by what means?Question 3: Was the device fixed to Kirk’s chest immediately presented to law enforcement for forensic examination with a documented chain of custody? If so, how exactly was the chain of custody documented?Question 4: Was proper first aid applied in an attempt to staunch the massively bleeding wound on Kirk’s neck?Question 5: How much time elapsed between Kirk sustaining the neck injury and being examined by an independent medical doctor with sufficient training to analyze the wound and form an opinion about what caused it?Question 6: Was Kirk still alive at the time his security team placed him in the backseat of the suburban?Question 7: If so, at what time did Kirk die? Was he dead on arrival at the hospital?Question 8: Who, apart from the Medical Examiner (who did NOT appear at the preliminary hearing) conducted a full examination of the wound? Did a doctor at the hospital document the characteristics of the wound?I ask these questions because they pertain to another (rather diabolical thought) that I had while contemplating this theory — namely, IF the microphone was indeed fashioned into a gun-like device, it wasn’t necessary for this device to kill Kirk, only to induce the spectacle of heavy bleeding from his neck.IF the device failed to kill Kirk, he could have been allowed to bleed out or additionally suffocated in the suburban before it reached the hospital.IF I were orchestrating this crime with a gun-like device fixed to Kirk’s upper chest and pointed at his throat, I would consider diverting attention from the true murder weapon by having a diversionary actor fire a rifle at the same time from the roof of the Losee student center, provided the rooftop wasn’t secured.With the use of radio or hand signals visible through a telescopic sight, the shooter could time the shot to coincide with the microphone-gun firing. The shooter could fire either a blank cartridge or a loaded cartridge at a high elevation so that the bullet would fly over the crowd and land on Utah Lake 1.5 miles to the west.And indeed, upon closer analysis of the audio track, I believe I hear an initial bang that sounds like it is propagated near Kirk, instantly followed by what sounds like a heavy caliber gunshot—not thereportof a supersonic bullet breaking the sound barrier, but the shot itself—fired in the direction of the recording microphone.IF I am hearing what I think I am hearing, it is consistent with a rifle cartridge discharging a fraction of a second later from a position in the open air over a hundred yards away.Because the shooter would play the role of a diversionary actor andnotthe killer, he could be any impressionable fruitcake young man who could be manipulated—as distinct from a trained assassin whose identity would raise red flags if he were caught.In addition to serving as a diversionary actor, the impressionable young man could, if caught, serve as apatsy.If I were Tyler Robinson’s defense attorney, I would consider that something along the following lines happened to my client.—Robinson was somehow persuaded to participate NOT as the killer, but as a diversionary actor who received assurances that he would escape.—Was toldnotto bring his cell phone with him onto the roof because his cell phone position could be subsequently pinpointed if he later fell under suspicion.—Was told to leave his cell phone at a designated place to serve as his alibi for a designated period of time before, during, and after the murder.—His cell phone was used by another actor to send incriminating text messages to his intimate friend after the murder was perpetrated.Again, I am NOTconcludingthat this is what happened. I am merely proposing that defense counsel should consider that Tyler Robinson was in some way manipulated to participate as adiversionary actorand then framed for the actual murder.I present these reflections as a starting point for additional analysis and discussion. Please let me know what you think in the comments, and please like and share this post with your friends.Subscribe nowShare

Summary: Examining the theory that the device fixed to Kirk's upper chest was weaponized.


The Prescription Is Freedom

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHPlease enjoy this long-format interview I had withNathan Fitzsimmons,Director of Operations, The Bitcoin Mentor.Nathan is a decade-long advocate for sound money, specializing in Austrian Economics and Libertarian Philosophy. Since 2007, he has been working in medical research, but after falling deep down the Bitcoin rabbit hole in 2020, he’s pivoted to educating others on Bitcoin, the importance of self-custody, and best practices for security. With an academic background in Business, Biology, Philosophy, and Computer Science, he is uniquely equipped to communicate the complexities of the Bitcoin ecosystem to a wide audience.“I save in bitcoin to provide a more abundant future for my family. I educate people about bitcoin to build a more prosperous community. Reach out, let’s chat, so you can do the same.”Bitcoin processes roughly 1–2% of global financial transactions and its market capitalization currently sits at approximately 3–4% of US GDP, but growing at a pace that terrifies central planners.I see the Bitcoin community as a major disruptor, similar to the work done at the McCullough Foundation which has exceeded advancements from the medical establishment during the pandemic years.  Please donate to theMcCullough Foundationto keep our work alive in bringing the world critical insights and medical truth.Please subscribe to FOCAL POINTS as a paying ($5 monthly) or founder member so we can continue to bring you the truth.AlterAImay be used to assist in searches, synthesis, and review.Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHPresident, McCullough Foundation

Summary: Dr. Peter McCullough and Nathan Fitzsimmons on breaking the twin monopolies of medicine and money — and why sovereignty is the only cure.


“I Plead the Fifth, They Plead Allegiance” — Democrats Shower Fauci With Praise While He Hides Behind the Fifth

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHMany have said the most shocking revelation from the July 29, 2026 US Senate HSGAC examination of Dr Anthony Fauci was the obvious political theatre by democratic senators who overlooked Fauci’s diary, pardon, and refusal to answer questions and gushed praise on the disgraced bureaucrat.  Dr McCullough gave reaction onJust the News, Real America’s Voicejust hours after the hearing.📋 The SceneAnthony Fauci appeared before the Senate, flanked by heavy security, trembling and visibly shaken — body language that Dr. McCullough described as“guilt with a capital G.”Over the course of the hearing, Fauci invoked the Fifth Amendment more than 100 times, refusing to answer questions about:The COVID-19 response he orchestratedHis publicly-accessible government diary revealing private beliefs that directly contradicted his public pronouncementsThe preemptive 10-year pardon shielding him from accountabilityThe origins of the pandemic and his role in shaping the narrativeThis is the same man who once declared:“If you question the science, you question me.”Now, when finally questioned under oath, he had nothing to say.🏛 The Political ChasmThe Republican InterrogatorsSenatorsRand Paul,Ron Johnson,Bernie Moreno, andJosh Hawleycame prepared. Johnson brought roughly six inches of studies demonstrating ivermectin’s efficacy — including the ICON study from Florida showing over 50% reduction in mortality for acute COVID-19. They pressed on:Why hospitals continued administering remdesivir against WHO guidance (the WHO said in November 2020:do not use it)Why patients had to hire attorneys just to force hospitals to administer ivermectinWhy shared decision-making and patient autonomy were discardedHow Fauci manipulated media coverage while undermining the Trump White House Task ForceMcCullough’s assessment:“Our Republican standards for truth really held up strong.”The Democrat Absolution CeremonyThis is where the transcript paints a damning picture — though the document doesn’t provide verbatim quotes from every Democrat senator, McCullough’s reaction is unambiguous:“I was shocked that the Democrats, instead of asking questions and wanting to learn about what happened through the pandemic, what Fauci knew — instead, they just heaped praise on him.”The Democrats treated a man who:Left his diary on government servers for years, revealing he privately believed things he publicly deniedOrchestrated policies that McCullough argues led to deaths from both COVID illness AND the vaccinesSpent the pandemic in self-aggrandizement — applying for cash prizes, celebrating media appearances, expressingzero concernfor actual patientsNever treated a single patient during the entire crisisSenator Andy Kimof New Jersey literally read Teddy Roosevelt’s“Man in the Arena”speech to praise Fauci — the same Fauci who just invoked the Fifth Amendment over a hundred times rather than answer for his pandemic decisions.The “man in the arena” speech is about the person whodares greatly, whostrives valiantly, whospends himself in a worthy cause. Roosevelt wrote it to honor those who step into the fray and risk failure in pursuit of something meaningful.Kim applied it to a bureaucrat who:Refused to answer a single substantive questionHid behind a preemptive pardon from BidenLeft a diary on government servers revealing he privately believed things he publicly deniedNever treated a single COVID patient while amassing media appearances and receiving cash prizes at taxpayers expenseThe irony is almost too perfect. The speech Kim read is aboutshowing up and being accountable— the exact opposite of what Fauci did. It was pure political theater, designed to reframe cowardice as courage and evasion as persecution. Kim wasn’t honoring a man in the arena. He was eulogizing the very concept of accountability that has been applied to Dr McCullough and the small group of brave doctors who stood in the arena, risked their lives, and treated patients early at home to prevent hospitalization and death.🔍 The Diary: A Window Into DuplicityFauci’s diary wasn’t leaked or stolen —he left it on government servers, essentially public, for years. When finally discovered, it revealed:Private musings that contradicted his public statementsKnowledge that the scientists he’d later ask to sign the “natural origins” letter didn’t believe what they were writingAn obsessive focus on media manipulation and personal accolades rather than patient welfareMcCullough’s verdict:“This is despicable.”He contrasted Fauci’s behavior with his own during the pandemic — hundreds of national TV appearances while simultaneously treating patients, developing protocols, and ultimately founding The Wellness Company to provide honest medical guidance.💊 Ivermectin: The Treatment They Knew WorkedSenator Johnson’s stack of studies made the case that’s now undeniable: ivermectin was safe, effective, and deliberately suppressed. Key points:The ICON study demonstrated over 50% mortality reductionPatients were forced to obtain legal representation just to access a FDA-approved medicationEven with court orders, some hospital physicians still refusedThe medical establishment looked to Fauci and placed institutional loyalty above the Hippocratic OathMcCullough notes the public is finally waking up — not just to ivermectin for infectious disease, but to its off-label anti-neoplastic (anti-cancer) properties as well.🧪 The One Real Victory: Gain-of-Function Research TerminatedAmid the Fauci spectacle, the Trump administration formally ended gain-of-function research the night before the hearing. McCullough called it“very important”but stressed it needs to go beyond just government funding —allsuch research must end:“It’s like having mad scientists trying to create nuclear bombs in academic laboratories. We can’t have it.”All experts now agree: if another pandemic emerges, it will come from an academic biolab — just like the Wuhan Institute of Virology.🏥 The Unfinished Business: Hospital AccountabilityMcCullough emphasized that the next frontier is dragging hospital CEOs and chief medical officers before Congress to answer:Why they continued using remdesivir against explicit WHO guidance — and still use it todayWhy patient and family wishes were systematically ignoredWhy shared decision-making was abandoned in favor of coercive protocolsHow they plan to win back public trust after, as McCullough put it,failing miserably through the pandemic🎯 The Bottom LineThe Democrats’ performance at this hearing wasn’t just partisan loyalty — it was a declaration that institutional power, once wielded, is beyond reproach. Fauci could plead the Fifth 111 times, leave his duplicitous diary on a government server, accept a preemptive pardon, and still receive standing ovations from one half of the political class.The message is clear: accountability is for people without the right party affiliation. For everyone else, there’s always the Fifth Amendment — and a room full of Democrats ready to call you a hero for using it.Thanks for reading FOCAL POINTS (Courageous Discourse™)! This post is public so feel free to share it.SharePlease subscribe toFOCAL POINTSas a paying ($5 monthly) or founder member so we can continue to bring you the truth.AlterAImay be used to assist in searches, synthesis, and review.Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPHChief Scientific Officer, The Wellness Companywww.twc.health/focalpoints

Summary: When a Disgraced Bureaucrat Becomes a Martyr for the Party of “Science”


Why Do Politicians Overreach with War?

With Ukraine continually striking Russian refineries, I figured it was just a matter of time before Russia responded with hypersonic missiles. Last night, several targets in Kiev were hit and not a single Russian missile was intercepted.This news comes along with reports that theUS is running out of interceptor missilesas President Trump continues to flounder around in his moronic war with Iran.History is full of emperors, kings, and presidents who chose to throw away peace and prosperity with the roll of military dice. The following are just a few of the cases that came to mind over morning coffee.Alexander the Great(reigned 336–323 BC) conquered the Persian Empire with extraordinary speed and tactical brilliance, but continued eastward into India and Central Asia long after the core objective was secured. Supply lines stretched across thousands of miles; his army mutinied at the Hyphasis River; andhis death left an ungovernable empire that fragmented almost immediately among the Diadochi.The pursuit of universal dominion outran administrative capacity and the loyalty of exhausted troops.Trajan(reigned 98–117 AD) pushed Rome’s frontiers to their greatest extent by conquering Dacia and briefly occupying Mesopotamia. The eastern campaigns yielded prestige and treasure but created indefensible salients. Within years of his death,Hadrian abandoned most of the Mesopotamian gains, recognizing that the empire lacked the manpower and resources to hold them against Parthian recovery and internal strain.Charles V(Holy Roman Emperor 1519–1556) inherited vast Habsburg territories and fought almost continuously against France, the Ottomans, German Protestants, and rebellious subjects. The sheer geographic dispersion of his domains—Spain, the Netherlands, Italy, Austria, and the Americas—made simultaneous defense impossible.Constant warfare bankrupted the Spanish treasury and left his successor, Philip II, with an overextended and debt-ridden inheritance.Lord George Germain, British Secretary of State for the American Department during the Revolutionary War, directed strategy from London with insufficient grasp of colonial geography, logistics, and political realities. Orders for the 1777 Saratoga campaign were poorly coordinated; Burgoyne’s advance from Canada was left unsupported.The resulting British defeat encouraged French intervention and turned a manageable colonial revolt into a global war Britain ultimately lost.Napoleon(Emperor 1804–1814/15) repeatedly overreached after early victories.The 1812 invasion of Russia ignored distance, climate, and Russian scorched-earth tactics; the Grande Armée disintegrated. Subsequent campaigns in Germany and the Hundred Days further depleted French manpower and invited the Sixth Coalition to finish him. Ambition for continental hegemony exceeded France’s demographic and industrial base.Leopold Berchtold, Austro-Hungarian foreign minister in 1914, responded to the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand by issuing an intentionally unacceptable ultimatum to Serbia and securing German backing for war.The gamble assumed a short, localized conflict that would restore Habsburg prestige. Instead it triggered the alliance system, producing a multi-front war that destroyed the Dual Monarchy.Adolf Hitler(German Chancellor 1933-1945) decision to invade the Soviet Union in 1941 (Operation Barbarossa), while still fighting Britain and later declaring war on the United States, constitutes the classic modern case of strategic overreach. Ideological goals of Lebensraum and racial conquest ignored logistical realities, winter conditions, and the vast depth of Soviet territory.The resulting two-front war, combined with the earlier failure to neutralize Britain, doomed the Third Reich.Young German prisoners of war captured during retreat from Moscow, 1942Lyndon B. Johnson(US President 1963-1969) escalated US involvement in Vietnam after Gulf of Tonkin incidents of 1964,, thereby rising U.S. troop levels from 23,000 in 1964 to more than 500,000 by 1968. American forces conducted large-scale search-and-destroy operations, intensive aerial bombing of the North (Operation Rolling Thunder), and efforts to interdict the Ho Chi Minh Trail. The goal was attrition—to inflict such heavy losses on the North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong that Hanoi would abandon its campaign to reunify the country under communist rule.The US did not prevail and hastily abandoned Vietnam in 1975.George W. Bush(US President 2001-2009) decision to invade Iraq in 2003, after the relatively successful Afghanistan campaign, rested on flawed intelligence about weapons of mass destruction and optimistic assumptions about post-invasion stability.The occupation stretched American forces, generated a prolonged insurgency, empowered regional rivals, and consumed resources that might otherwise have focused on the original Afghan theater or homeland security. The long-term strategic costs far exceeded the initial military success.US hastily abandons Afghanistan to Taliban in Aug. 2021 after 20 year occupationDonald Trump(US President, 2017-2021 and 2025 to today) attacked Iran on February 28, 2026 and is now in the 6th month of what was initially proclaimed to be a 4-week war to get rid of  “a nuclear program” that was “obliterated” in 2025.In each case the pattern is similar: the conviction of military dominance encouraged expansion beyond the point where political will, logistics, alliances, or domestic resources could sustain the effort. Overreach squandered advantage and resulted in significant costs and lasting liability.It’s an astonishing thing that so many leaders in history have ignored the disasters of overreach in the past. At an event at the German Bundestag this summer, I fell into a conversation with a military historian about Germany’s current collision course with Russia. I asked him if the current German government is aware of the disasters of Napoleon’s invasion of Russia in 1812 and Hitler’s invasion of Russia in 1941.“Acutely,” he replied, “just at the German general staff was acutely aware of Napoleon’s disastrous 1812 invasion.”Why do the vainglorious men who ascend to political power persistently believe that they needn’t heed the lessons of history and geography? Why do they embrace the irrational belief that “this time it’s different?”As someone who is very mindful of what history teaches us — especially the primary lesson that coercive power is inherently limited —I find this recurring pattern perplexing in the extreme.Please let me know what you think in the comments.Subscribe nowShare


BREAKING: Criminal Referral Requests Sent to All 50 State Attorneys General Seek Prosecutions of Fauci and Top Public-Health Officials

byNicolas Hulscher, MPHIn a sweeping nationwide criminal-accountability campaign, criminal referral requests have been sent to the attorneys general of all 50 states seeking investigations and prosecutions of Anthony Fauci and other top public-health officials for their roles in the “COVID Criminal Enterprise.”The 50-state campaign was launched by Vires Law Group and Florida gubernatorial candidate Rachel Rodriguez through the Federal Accountability Freedom Operation. It represents the culmination of years of victim collection, witness testimony, legal analysis, and evidence gathering tied to COVID-era hospital policies and treatment protocols.The requests cite potential offenses including murder, terrorism, racketeering, manslaughter, human trafficking, elder abuse, false imprisonment, kidnapping, aggravated assault, battery, and reckless conduct. They call on state prosecutors to examine senior public-health officials, hospital administrators, healthcare providers, and institutions accused of participating in policies that caused preventable deaths and serious injuries.The Officials NamedThe individuals identified for investigation include Anthony Fauci, Cliff Lane, David Morens, Francis Collins, Deborah Birx, Rochelle Walensky, Stephen Hahn, Janet Woodcock, Rick Bright, Peter Hotez, Peter Daszak, Ralph Baric, and Christine Grady.Hospital administrators and healthcare providers are also named as potential subjects of investigation for implementing the policies and protocols at the center of the allegations.The central legal argument is that senior officials cannot escape scrutiny simply because many of the disputed policies were carried out by hospitals and medical personnel further down the chain. The requests ask prosecutors to examine who designed the policies, who enforced them, who benefited financially, and who was harmed.A Case Built Around VictimsThe nationwide action is rooted in testimony from families who say their loved ones entered hospitals seeking care and were instead isolated, denied requested treatment, subjected to rigid protocols, and ultimately killed or seriously harmed.The materials collected include identified victims, family statements, witness information, legal briefs, sworn declarations, financial records, and testimony from medical professionals and whistleblowers.One major victim filing includes 75 identified patients and 31 written statements from surviving family members. More than 40 additional victims came forward after the original effort began, expanding the body of evidence and testimony available to investigators.These families describe a recurring pattern: patients separated from loved ones, denied access to advocates, prevented from receiving requested medications, pressured into unwanted interventions, and placed on standardized protocols despite individual medical concerns.What Happened Inside HospitalsThe filings describe a top-down system in which federal health agencies shaped COVID policy, hospital systems enforced it, and physicians and patients lost control over individualized medical decisions.They allege that hospitals received financial incentives connected to COVID diagnoses, admissions, treatments, and institutional compliance. At the same time, patients were denied meaningful informed consent and physicians who challenged the protocols faced retaliation, termination, or threats against their licenses.The materials specifically raise concerns about the use of remdesivir, the suppression of alternative treatments, the isolation of patients from family members, and the denial of requested care.A sworn declaration from a former trauma and critical-care surgeon describes retaliation against dissenting physicians, manipulation of COVID diagnoses and death records, denial of care to unvaccinated patients, suppression of alternative treatments, and intense institutional pressure tied to federal requirements and hospital finances.The Financial Incentive StructureThe requests place major emphasis on the financial system surrounding COVID hospital care.They allege that hospitals and administrators received financial benefits for following standardized COVID protocols while physicians were discouraged from using individualized treatment plans. The legal theory is that these incentives helped create a system in which financial and institutional interests took priority over patient autonomy and survival.The evidence packages include material intended to help prosecutors examine the relationship between government policy, hospital reimbursement, protocol enforcement, and patient outcomes.Why the States MatterThe strategy is centered on state and county prosecution because the deaths, injuries, and alleged unlawful acts occurred within state jurisdictions.State prosecutors have authority over crimes including homicide, manslaughter, abuse, kidnapping, false imprisonment, human trafficking, terrorism, and racketeering. The requests argue that federal titles, former government positions, and federal pardons do not automatically prevent investigation of potential state crimes.Each attorney general is being asked to examine the evidence, identify victims and responsible parties within the state, interview witnesses and surviving family members, and pursue charges wherever the evidence supports criminal liability.A Nationwide Demand for AccountabilityThis is not a symbolic appeal or a generalized demand for answers. It is a coordinated legal campaign involving named individuals, identified victims, sworn testimony, state criminal statutes, and requests for prosecution across the entire country.For years, victims’ families have sought criminal investigations into the policies and protocols that caused the deaths of their loved ones.Their evidence has now been placed before authorities in all 50 states.Nicolas Hulscher, MPHEpidemiologist and Foundation Administrator, McCullough FoundationSupport our mission:mcculloughfnd.orgPlease consider following both theMcCullough Foundationandmy personal accountonX(formerly Twitter) for further content.FOCAL POINTS (Courageous Discourse™) is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber.

Summary: The 50-state legal campaign cites murder, terrorism, racketeering, human trafficking, elder abuse, and other serious offenses tied to COVID-era hospital protocols and financial incentives.