The following excerpt is taken from the new book &#8220;<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Proportionality-Israels-Just-Gaza/dp/B0F841ZJTX">Beyond Proportionality: Israel&#8217;s Just War In Gaza,</a>&#8221; by Thane Rosenbaum (Wicked Son/Post Hill Press, May 2025).
* * *
<h3>INTRODUCTION: “J’accuse!” — The Case Against Israel</h3>
At the turn of the nineteenth century, a political scandal in France galvanized public opinion all over the world. Known as the Dreyfus Affair, at its root was the inexorable display and mass hatred of Jews. This same antisemitic fervor, which a few decades later would materialize into the Holocaust, had been around for two millennia. Occasionally, it would manifest itself in pogroms and mass expulsions. Along the way, it went from latent to lethal, and emanated from a lie.
This time, however, the antisemitism was organized, sanctioned by the government, fueled by the press, and openly embraced by many people who regarded themselves as highly cultivated and civilized. Artists and intellectuals took a special interest in joining the mob. And it came pre-packaged with an easily disproved conspiracy theory involving a treasonous Jewish military officer.
Jews in France had long enjoyed the full panoply of civil rights. Indeed, during the French Revolution, France had become the first European nation to emancipate its Jewish population. For nearly a century, French Jews had participated in every facet of cosmopolitan life among the professional classes and cultural elite. But suddenly, they found themselves facing a backlash unlike anything they had experienced before.
The Dreyfus Affair made the unspoken hatred of Jews not just acceptable but fashionable. Seemingly overnight, Jews in France went from being socially accepted and having a sense of security to being on the receiving end of wild denunciations for their clannishness, duplicity, greed, and dual loyalty.
And much like Nazi Germany, the nerve center of these societal convulsions burned brightest on university campuses, in the pages of the mainstream press, and wherever artists and writers congregated. The fact that it all originated from an easily disprovable lie was of little concern. The case against Dreyfus was merely a pretext to something far worse.
<div id="attachment_942309" style="width: 417px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Proportionality-Israels-Just-Gaza/dp/B0F841ZJTX"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-942309" class="size-large wp-image-942309" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/07/MixCollage-02-Jul-2025-12-29-PM-7049-407x576.jpg" alt="Credit: Post Hill Press/Wicked Son" width="407" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/07/MixCollage-02-Jul-2025-12-29-PM-7049-407x576.jpg 407w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/07/MixCollage-02-Jul-2025-12-29-PM-7049-212x300.jpg 212w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/07/MixCollage-02-Jul-2025-12-29-PM-7049-768x1086.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/07/MixCollage-02-Jul-2025-12-29-PM-7049-1086x1536.jpg 1086w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/07/MixCollage-02-Jul-2025-12-29-PM-7049-1448x2048.jpg 1448w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/07/MixCollage-02-Jul-2025-12-29-PM-7049-scaled.jpg 1810w" sizes="(max-width: 407px) 100vw, 407px" /></a>Credit: Post Hill Press/Wicked Son</div>
Captain Alfred Dreyfus was an officer on the French military general staff accused of passing state secrets to Germany — the despised aggressor nation that during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 had humiliated France and annexed Alsace and Moselle. Someone had to be blamed, and Dreyfus, a high-ranking Jewish officer, fully assimilated yet perceived as a foreigner, was an easy fall guy even though there was no actual evidence of his wrongdoing. The French legal system relied upon forged documents — manufactured by military counterintelligence — to falsify his guilt. The letters were not even in Dreyfus’ handwriting.
That’s not to say there was no spy within the ranks of senior military officers. But it wasn’t Captain Dreyfus. Two years after he was court-martialed for treason and shipped off to Devil’s Island, a notorious tropical hellhole where many prisoners died of disease and malnutrition, the French Army uncovered evidence implicating the true culprit — Major Walsin Esterhazy, who had sold secret documents to the German Embassy. But by then the nation was awash in anti-Jewish bigotry. Dreyfus should have been exonerated instantly. Instead, he was returned to France to face a new trial, where he was once again convicted and given an enhanced sentence.
Newspapers around the world covered the trial and its aftermath. A slogan representative of the times referred to Dreyfus as “the Jew who is everywhere but belongs nowhere.” It should come as no surprise to learn that the Dreyfus Affair roughly coincided with the publication of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, another forged document, this one alleging a Jewish conspiracy to conquer the world.
Events shifted dramatically when one of France’s leading intellectuals, the novelist and playwright Émile Zola, wrote a lengthy front-page essay — famously titled “J’Accuse&#8230;!” — in which he charged the French government and legal system with a coverup. Zola wrote, “Here&#8230;are the facts which explain how a miscarriage of justice could be made; and the moral evidence, the financial circumstances of Dreyfus, the absence of reason, his continual cry of innocence&#8230;the hunting for the ‘dirty Jews,’ which dishonours our time.” Given the public embarrassment to the nation’s institutions, Zola himself was brought to trial and convicted of libel. He fled to London.
Eventually, the obsession with Dreyfus dissipated. The French government and its people finally came to recognize that they had been handed a convenient excuse to shift blame away from France’s military and rest it instead with a familiar villain. National regret ensued, and by 1906, Dreyfus was exonerated, and his rank restored.
But anyone familiar with these events can’t help but see the parallel with what is happening today. The global reaction to Israel’s eighteen-month-long war in Gaza has had many of the same elements: heightened emotions, irrational arguments, distorted histories, the rejection of obvious truths, forged documents, falsified facts, misapplied laws, antisemitic stereotypes, and worldwide anti-Jewish rage. But instead of a single Jewish officer serving as the focal point, this time it was the Jewish state, and its professional military, who stand falsely accused — and with much the same imagery. Thus, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is often depicted as drinking the blood of Palestinian children.
Such fabrications are all the more paradoxical given the events that preceded and fully justified Israel’s retaliatory war against Hamas. These sensationalized condemnations completely overlook and ignore what started the conflict in the first place. On the morning of October 7, 2023, southern Israel was invaded — by land, air, and sea — by six thousand Palestinians from Gaza. Most were terrorists with Hamas and Islamic Jihad, but many were ordinary civilians. It was a planned and coordinated attack that lasted several hours and targeted the concert-goers at the Nova Music Festival, most of whom were young peace-loving Israelis.
* * *
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<div class="a-cardui-content a-cardui-uninitialized _about-the-author-card_carouselItemStyles_peekableContent__hWM3i" data-a-max-height="80">
Thane Rosenbaum is an essayist, law professor, and author of both fiction and nonfiction titles, including the novels, &#8220;How Sweet It Is!&#8221;,&#8221; The Stranger Within Sarah Stein,&#8221; &#8220;The Golems of Gotham,&#8221; &#8220;Second Hand Smoke,&#8221; and &#8220;Elijah Visible.&#8221; His articles, reviews and essays appear frequently in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, CNN, Huffington Post and Daily Beast, among other national publications.
</div>
</div>
This excerpt from &#8220;<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Proportionality-Israels-Just-Gaza/dp/B0F841ZJTX">Beyond Proportionality: Israel&#8217;s Just War In Gaza,</a>&#8221; by Thane Rosenbaum is published by permission from Post Hill Press/Wicked Son.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

TOPSHOT-ISRAEL-PALESTINIAN-CONFLICT

When Lies Turn Deadly: The Century-Old Script Behind Today’s Anti-Israel Fury

Anti-Semitism

Books

France

Gaza

Israel

Israel Defense Forces (IDF)

Jewish

Middle East

October 7

Right now, the West is in its ascendancy, not in its decline.
Over the weekend, President Trump championed a peace deal that is now cut between Congo and Rwanda, brokered by the White House to stop the bloodshed in Congo, where a militia allegedly backed by Rwanda occupies huge areas of land.
President Trump explained that he is brokering peace throughout the world, saying, “This is a tremendous breakthrough. In a few short months, we&#8217;ve now achieved peace between India and Pakistan, Israel and Iran, and the DRC and Rwanda. And a couple of others also, Serbia was getting ready to go to war with a group I won&#8217;t even mention because it didn&#8217;t happen. We were able to stop it.”
He&#8217;s right about that. He also continues to maintain his strength in the face of an Iran that has pledged further nuclear development. He said to Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei, listen, you keep lying and saying that you won? You didn&#8217;t. You got your ass kicked.
“I&#8217;m putting out a little statement,” <a href="https://x.com/breeadail/status/1938650917127233987">he stated</a>. “I&#8217;m going to respond to the Ayatollah’s statement yesterday that ‘We won the war.’ Won the war? And I said, ‘Look, you&#8217;re a man of great faith, a man who&#8217;s highly respected in his country. You have to tell the truth, you got beat to hell … It would be great if they (Iran) didn&#8217;t have that hate. But the last thing they&#8217;re thinking about is nuclear weapons right now.”
“Would you consider bombing the country again?” <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvgenq599kwo">he was asked</a>. “Sure. Without question. Absolutely. That would be unbelievable,” he answered. “But, you know, our incredible fliers; I call them the shots. These guys are unbelievable. Think. From 52,000 feet, they hit the equivalent of a refrigerator door. They actually hit it right in the center, so it&#8217;s much smaller than that.”
But at a time when the West should be resurgent and on the upswing, instead you have America&#8217;s major cities: New York City, L.A., and Chicago, being run by full-scale left-wing nutcases who are deeply ensconced with hatred for their own civilization. The same thing has happened in London in the UK. It&#8217;s been happening in France as well.
It&#8217;s a serious threat to the West. And the biggest threat to the West is not external at this point.
The biggest threat to the West is internal: the Red-Green Alliance, the communists/socialists, and the Hamasniks coming together in hatred of their own civilization.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/bss-ep-2228?elementPosition=5&amp;row=2&amp;rowHeadline=Latest+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel">WATCH: The Ben Shapiro Show</a></h3>
All of this ties into July 4. It&#8217;s going to be great. I hope you&#8217;re going to have a wonderful Independence Day, celebrating the foundation of the greatest country in the history of the world, but we should talk about a myth that has been purveyed about July 4 and about the United States in general.
This, of course, is the 1619 myth that “America was founded on slavery and that the Revolutionary War was fought for the preservation of slavery.”
There are many lies that are told about our civilization, particularly about the foundation of our civilization, in order to somehow claim that our civilization should be torn down.
If you were to poll the morons of Glastonbury in the UK who chanted “Death to the IDF” and mocked white Britons by chanting “I hear you want your country back. Well, shut the f*** up,” or the Democratic primary voters for Zohran Mamdani in New York about what they think of the United States, they would surely agree with the myth that America was founded on slavery.
It&#8217;s not true.
A huge number of the Founders overtly opposed slavery in principle. Even those who held slaves themselves did not provide significant defenses of slavery. That included George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. Washington said, “There&#8217;s not a man living who wishes more sincerely than I do to see a plan adopted for its abolition.” Thomas Jefferson&#8217;s original draft of the Declaration of Independence called the slave trade an “execrable commerce” and “an affront against human nature itself.” John Jay said, “It is much to be wished that slavery may be abolished, to contend for our own liberty, and to deny that blessing to others involves an inconsistency not to be excused.” Benjamin Franklin, James Madison, John Adams, and Alexander Hamilton spoke against slavery as well.
Why was slavery included in the Constitution of the United States originally? Because there were still slave-holding states in the United States. Many of the northern states were not slave holding states, but the southern states were. And the question was, could you get together a coalition to defeat the British, or could you not?
This was not a fight on behalf of promoting slavery. Slavery remained legal in the British Empire until 1833. So this was not a fight in which one side was pro-slavery and one side was anti-slavery. Far from it. The leaders in America ideologically were not in favor of slavery. There was a practical on-the-ground consideration, which was that many of the southern states were reliant on slave labor. 
Again, that&#8217;s an evil not to be excused, but to claim that the Revolutionary War was about slavery is to be ignorant of history. In fact, as soon as the Revolution began, there were eight states that immediately came out and started abolishing slavery: Vermont, 1777. Pennsylvania, 1780. Massachusetts and New Hampshire, 1783. Rhode Island and Connecticut, 1784. New York, 1799. New Jersey 1804.
<h3><a href="https://get.dailywire.com/freedom/">JULY 4 SALE: Get Six Months Of DW+ Free</a></h3>
As the Claremont Institute&#8217;s Arthur Milikh once <a href="https://www.heritage.org/american-history/commentary/1776-not-1619">pointed out</a>:
<blockquote>The Founders laid the constitutional ground for abolishing slavery. One example is <a href="https://www.heritage.org/constitution/#!/articles/1/essays/60/slave-trade">Article I, Section 9, Clause 1</a>, which states that Congress could prohibit importation of slaves starting in 1808. On the first day that this clause became operative, Congress passed, and President Thomas Jefferson signed, this prohibition into law. Congress took additional steps to restrict slavery. It passed the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, which outlawed slavery in the Northwest Territories. Seven years later, Congress made it illegal to build ships for the purpose of the slave trade.</blockquote>
It&#8217;s important to debunk some of these myths, because those myths become the basis for claiming that the West is uniquely evil. Slavery has indeed been an evil institution, but it has also been virtually universal. 
The question isn&#8217;t whether the Founding Fathers were hypocrites about slavery. Some were; some weren&#8217;t. The question truly is: Why did it take the West to end slavery?
In fact, slavery is still practiced in many of the areas that are favorites of the Glastonbury crowd. Many of the places that they are claiming are “havens of freedom,” that require “less of a heavy Western hand,” are places that are still practicing slavery.
A huge part of the Middle East still engages in slavery. Not Israel, but many of its opponents. That is the point.
July 4 spells a clarion call for human freedom, and it has been seen that way by right-minded people ever since.
This is why the very famous Frederick Douglass speech about what July 4 meant to the slave doesn&#8217;t say that July 4 is bad. It says that the problem with the 4th of July is that the principles that the Founding Fathers sought to instill had not yet been realized.
That is the right approach, a historically accurate and mature approach, instead of the leftist scumbag wing that simply suggests the West is uniquely evil when in reality the West is uniquely good.

President Trump Speaks On Recent Supreme Court Rulings At The White House

The Resurgent West: Why Today’s Triumphs Outweigh Our Critics

Ben Shapiro

Europe

Founding Fathers

Iran

Opinion

President Trump

Slavery

Western Civilization

Iran&#8217;s senior Shiite cleric has declared war on the President of the United States. The Islamic Republic’s Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi issued a <a href="https://x.com/mdubowitz/status/1939343304836911200">fatwa</a> stating that threats against Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei — particularly by President Trump — constitute a war against Islam. &#8220;Any collaboration,&#8221; he wrote, &#8220;is forbidden. Muslims must respond with &#8216;severe punishment.'&#8221;
This is not empty rhetoric. It’s a directive. The regime is using religious law to justify action against American political leadership. This fatwa is not an outlier — it is state-sanctioned pretext for terror.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
🚨 FATWA: Iran’s Grand Ayatollah Makarem Shirazi — one of the most senior Shia clerics in Qom — has issued a ruling declaring that threats against Khamenei by President Trump and others amount to a “war against Islam.” Remaining silent is “haram,” he says, and Muslims must… <a href="https://t.co/2jbgPjpW0l">pic.twitter.com/2jbgPjpW0l</a>
&mdash; Mark Dubowitz (@mdubowitz) <a href="https://twitter.com/mdubowitz/status/1939343304836911200?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 29, 2025</a></blockquote>
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The Islamic Republic has a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/this-princeton-scholar-was-once-a-high-ranking-iranian-official-why-is-he-still-here?author=Aidin+Panahi&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=2&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=This+Princeton+Scholar+Was+Once+A+High-Ranking+Iranian+Official.+Why+Is+He+Still+Here%3F">documented history</a> of carrying out extraterritorial operations: assassinations in Europe, surveillance of U.S. targets, plots against dissidents, and support for militant proxies. Now, after President Trump ordered strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities and humiliated Khamenei in his press conference, the regime is escalating. It is signaling its operatives — at home and abroad — that retaliation is not just permissible. It is required.
This fatwa gives legal and religious cover for future attacks. It sets the stage for proxy operations, lone actor violence, and state-sponsored terror framed as divine justice. The regime has already <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/from-fordow-to-freedom-a-strategy-for-ending-the-islamic-republic?author=Aidin+Panahi&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=From+Fordow+To+Freedom%3A+A+Strategy+For+Ending+The+Islamic+Republic">authorized</a> retaliation against American and Israeli targets. The network is active. The planning is done. All that remains is execution. The regime’s intentions are not hypothetical. In the months leading up to the 2024 U.S. presidential election, Iranian operatives were actively plotting to assassinate Donald Trump, according to Western intelligence sources.
<div id="attachment_941273" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-941273" class="size-large wp-image-941273" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/GettyImages-1988734032-864x576.jpg" alt="Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi is delivering a sermon during a turban-wearing ceremony at a seminary in the holy city of Qom, 145 km (90 miles) south of Tehran, on February 8, 2024. (Photo by Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Getty Images)" width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/GettyImages-1988734032-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/GettyImages-1988734032-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/GettyImages-1988734032-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/GettyImages-1988734032.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" />Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi is delivering a sermon. February 8, 2024. Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Getty Images.</div>
These networks are not limited to Iran or the Middle East. They are embedded inside the United States. The regime has exploited Palestinian solidarity movements, college encampments, and so-called cultural centers to build cover and infrastructure for future operations. What appears to be activism is, in many cases, ideological and logistical preparation. The Islamic Republic has skillfully used progressive activists, woke institutions, and even elements of the Democratic political class as unknowing tools — shielding itself behind civil rights rhetoric while laying the groundwork for subversion and violence. In <a href="https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/two-men-charged-alleged-plot-assassinate-saudi-arabian-ambassador-united-states">2011</a>, an Iranian-American working for the Quds Force was charged with plotting to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington, D.C. That was over a decade ago. The capabilities have only expanded since.
This is not a theoretical risk. It’s an operational doctrine.
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The United States must respond accordingly.
First: Federal authorities must treat this fatwa as an actionable threat. DHS, FBI, Secret Service, and intelligence agencies must identify and dismantle regime-linked cells, proxies, and influence networks operating inside the United States under cultural, religious, or diplomatic cover.
Second: Islamic Republic’s top officials who issue or endorse calls for violence must be designated as enablers of terrorism and sanctioned accordingly. That includes financial, digital, and travel restrictions without exception.
Third: The regime must not outlast this escalation. The U.S. must adopt a policy of full support for regime change led by the Iranian people. That means providing technical, financial, and political support to Reza Pahlavi, who has accepted the responsibility of leading the transition after millions of Iranians — both inside the country and abroad—have chanted his name and called on him to represent their national will.
Fourth: The U.S. must support Israel’s precision operations targeting the regime’s nuclear, military, and intelligence assets — and where necessary, extend that support to neutralizing select political and religious officials who are operational leaders in the regime’s state-directed terror infrastructure. This must be framed and executed as counterterrorism.
Fifth: The U.S. must initiate immediate and comprehensive <a href="https://www.hstoday.us/featured/perspective-the-u-s-must-investigate-iranian-regime-networks-inside-the-homeland/">screening</a> of Iranian nationals already inside the country — including visa holders, green card recipients, and naturalized citizens — who maintain any connection to regime institutions, propaganda networks, or clerical systems. If the U.S. accepts that it is under asymmetric threat, it must respond accordingly. A national emergency declaration should be on the table.
<div id="attachment_941281" style="width: 824px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-941281" class="size-large wp-image-941281" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/GettyImages-2221794644-814x576.jpg" alt="28 June 2025, Hesse, Frankfurt/Main: Mainly exiles and German-Iranians protest against the Mullah regime in Iran at a rally at the Hauptwache in Frankfurt. One man holds a photo of Reza Pahlavi II, who is living in exile. Photo: Boris Roessler/dpa (Photo by Boris Roessler/picture alliance via Getty Images)" width="814" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/GettyImages-2221794644-814x576.jpg 814w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/GettyImages-2221794644-300x212.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/GettyImages-2221794644-768x544.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/GettyImages-2221794644.jpg 1024w" sizes="(max-width: 814px) 100vw, 814px" />28 June 2025, Hesse, Frankfurt/Main: German-Iranians protest against the Mullah regime in Iran at a rally at the Hauptwache in Frankfurt. One man holds a photo of Reza Pahlavi II, who is living in exile. Photo: Boris Roessler/picture alliance via Getty Images</div>
These actions are not optional. They are overdue. If left unchecked, this regime will act on its threats.
There is no negotiation pathway. There is no moderation. The Islamic Republic is not a government. It is a transnational threat actor. It issues religious rulings as operational orders. It does not fear diplomacy; it fears consequences.
The fatwa against President Trump is a signal. September 11th began with similar rhetoric. Now, another one has been issued — and this time, the target is named. If the U.S. ignores it, the next attack will not be a press release. It will be a body count.
* * *
Dr. Aidin Panahi is an Iranian-American research professor, energy expert, and political activist. He is the cofounder of the “From Boston to Iran” initiative and his analyses on security and policy issues have appeared in outlets including The Jerusalem Post, Washington Times, the Jerusalem Strategic Tribune, Middle East Forum, Homeland Security Today, and Visegrád24. X: @Aidin_FreeIran
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Iran-Pro-Hezbollah-Funeral

The Islamic Republic Issued A Fatwa On Trump. The U.S. Must Prepare Accordingly.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei

Islamic Jihad

Muslims

Secret Service

President Donald Trump said that he expects more countries will join the Abraham Accords that seek to normalize relations between Israel and Arab nations.
During an interview on &#8220;Sunday Morning Futures,&#8221; anchor Maria Bartiromo asked Trump if any other country had suggested to him that they wanted to sign up after the U.S. military bombed Iranian sites to prevent Tehran from achieving nuclear weapons.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-media-max-width="560">
.<a href="https://twitter.com/MariaBartiromo?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@MariaBartiromo</a>: “Has any other country suggested to you… that they want to join the Abraham Accords?”<a href="https://twitter.com/POTUS?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@POTUS</a>: “Yes. So, we have some really great countries in there right now and I think we’re going to start loading them up because Iran was the primary problem.” <a href="https://t.co/LD6AKsPqKU">pic.twitter.com/LD6AKsPqKU</a>
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) <a href="https://twitter.com/RapidResponse47/status/1939327573445447684?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 29, 2025</a></blockquote>
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&#8220;Yes, so we have some really great countries in there right now, and I think we&#8217;re going to start loading them up because Iran was the primary problem. I actually thought Iran would, I actually, we had a period of time where I thought Iran would join the Abraham Accords along with everybody else, and frankly they would have been better off than where they are right now,&#8221; Trump said.
Bartiromo asked Trump if Syria in particular would enter the Abraham Accords.
&#8220;Well, I don&#8217;t know, but I did take off the sanctions at the request of some of the other countries in the area that are friends of ours,&#8221; Trump replied. &#8220;I took off the sanctions on Syria to give them a chance at, you know, the sanctions are biting. They&#8217;re very strong. And we have sanctions on Iran, too. And you know, you take them off when, I sort of gave the expression today, you get more sometimes with honey than you do with vinegar.&#8221;
The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-calls-on-saudi-arabia-to-join-abraham-accords-my-fervent-hope" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a> last month that Trump called on Saudi Arabia to join the Abraham Accords, a series of treaties that he put together during his first term that already includes the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco.
&#8220;It’s been an amazing thing, the Abraham Accords, and it’s my fervent hope, wish, and even my dream that Saudi Arabia — a place I have such respect for, especially over the last fairly short period of time, what you’ve been able to do — but will soon be joining the Abraham Accords,&#8221; Trump said during a speech in Riyadh.
Last week, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff <a href="https://x.com/RapidResponse47/status/1937975541748945222" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a> on CNBC, &#8220;One of the President&#8217;s key objectives is that the Abraham Accords be expanded &#8230; We think we&#8217;re going to have some pretty big announcements on countries that are now coming in to the Abraham Peace Accords.&#8221;

President Donald J. Trump

Trump Predicts More Nations Will Join Abraham Accords After Iran Strikes

Abraham Accords

Donald Trump

Saudi Arabia

U.S.

The legacy media have stonewalled letting President Trump have the win he deserves for his strike on the Iranian nuclear facilities. What President Trump did in Iran is one of the most historic wins of my lifetime.
Just to recap, Israel launched an overwhelming aerial assault on the Iranian facilities, nuclear and missile-based. They were going after ballistic missile development factories in Iran — their ballistic missile stockpiles, their missile launchers — as well as their nuclear facilities.
For nearly two weeks, Israel hammered the Iranians. But there was one facility in particular, Fordo, which was some 250-300 meters underground. And Israel did not have the ordnance capable of penetrating that facility. So President Trump authorized a B-2 strike using 30,000 pound bombs on Fordow, and in his words, “obliterated” the site.
The media won&#8217;t let that be the case, that President Trump used force to end the Iranian nuclear program and then declared the war over — and it was over.
It was, in fact, a historic win, and a win that we haven&#8217;t seen in American foreign policy in my lifetime: One strike on the Iranian nuclear facilities, a complete reshuffling of the deck in the Middle East with Israel as a regional powerhouse and Iran a supplicant, and no continuous war between Israel and Iran, no hot war continuing.
With no American casualties, by the way.
An amazing accomplishment.
But the media just won&#8217;t let President Trump have it. They won&#8217;t. They keep claiming over and over and over that, actually, maybe Fordo wasn&#8217;t destroyed. In fact, Fordo is fine. Maybe the Israeli-American effort was completely for naught, they claim.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/bss-ep-2227-member-exclusive?elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=The+Ben+Shapiro+Show&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Carousel">WATCH: The Ben Shapiro Show</a></h3>
They have no basis upon which to say this, other than the word of Ayatollah Khamenei, who has been tweeting that everything is hunky dory from his bunker, presumably in Tehran, <a href="https://x.com/khamenei_ir/status/1938180907887698222">claiming</a> with astonishing chutzpah: 
<blockquote>With all that commotion and all those claims, the Zionist regime was practically knocked out and crushed under the blows of the Islamic Republic.</blockquote>
You have to be high on drugs to believe this. He was literally hiding in a bunker for the entirety of the war. His regime was so weak that the Israeli Air Force was flying continuous sorties unhindered over Iranian airspace, with zero casualties on the IAF side, zero, for two weeks.
And yet <a href="https://x.com/khamenei_ir/status/1938184845873844536">he says</a> that, in reality, the “Zionist regime,” Israel, was practically knocked out and crushed:
<blockquote>My congratulations on our dear Iran’s victory over the US regime. The US regime entered the war directly because it felt that if it didn’t, the Zionist regime would be completely destroyed. It entered the war in an effort to save that regime but achieved nothing.</blockquote>
The Baghdad Bob aspect in the Middle East is always absurd to Westerners. Ayatollah Khomeini trying to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, at least in terms of public perception, does not mean that he was not, in fact, hammered or that the nuclear program is intact.
But Khamenei <a href="https://x.com/khamenei_ir/status/1938185956793761808">tweeted out:</a>
<blockquote>The Islamic Republic delivered a heavy slap to the US’s face. It attacked and inflicted damage on the Al-Udeid Air Base, which is one of the key US bases in the region.</blockquote>
Nope. Actually, he called and he whined and begged the Qataris and the Americans to allow him to send a few missiles at the base, none of which actually hit.
Why am I telling you what Khamenei is saying? Because you&#8217;re hearing it echoed by the media. The New York Times and CNN reported that there was a Defense Intelligence Agency estimate that Fordo had not been knocked out, not been obliterated, not even been severely damaged.
It turned out that that was a low-confidence assessment by one of 18 intelligence agencies under the DIA. It didn’t matter. The media ran with it anyway. This became the top story in the media.
<h3><a href="https://get.dailywire.com/freedom/">JULY 4 SALE: Get Six Months Of DW+ Free</a></h3>
How do we know that it&#8217;s stupid? According to the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/26/world/middleeast/centrifuges-fordo-damage-iran.html">UN nuclear watchdog</a> head, the director general of the IAEA, there was “no escaping significant physical damage after the U.S. strike on the Iranian facility.” Barak Ravid of Axios, a front man for Left-wing and isolationist agitprop coming out from various leak-driven parts of various administrations, <a href="https://x.com/BarakRavid/status/1938229914244682140">tweeted</a>, “I told Jake Tapper that a senior Israeli intelligence official told me that other than the word ‘obliterated’ the reality regarding the results of the attack on Iran is much closer to where Trump says it is than to where the initial DIA report said it was.”
All of this came to a head yesterday when Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth did a press conference. He crushed the fake news that&#8217;s been targeting President Trump, declaring:
<blockquote>Because you cheer against Trump so hard — it&#8217;s like in your DNA and in your blood to cheer against Trump because you want him not to be successful so bad — you have to cheer against the efficacy of these strikes. You have to hope maybe they weren&#8217;t effective. Maybe the way the Trump administration represented them isn&#8217;t true. So let&#8217;s take half-truths, spun information, leaked information, and then spin it. Spin it in every way we can to try to cause doubt and manipulate the public mind over whether or not our brave pilots were successful.
This was an historically successful attack. We should celebrate it as Americans, and it gives us a chance to have peace, a chance to have a deal and an opportunity to prevent a nuclear Iran, which is something President Trump talked about for 20 years.</blockquote>
He was correct.
Hegseth wasn’t done. He called on Jennifer Griffin of Fox News, who&#8217;d been one of the people who reported this particular DIA assessment.
<blockquote>Griffin: Do you have certainty that all the highly enriched uranium was inside the Fordo mountain, or some of it, because there were satellite photos that showed more than a dozen trucks there two days in advance. Are you certain none of that highly enriched uranium was moved?</blockquote>
<blockquote>Hegseth: Of course, we&#8217;re watching every single aspect. But, Jennifer, you&#8217;ve been about the worst, the one who misrepresents the most intentionally what the president says.
Griffin: I was reporting about the ventilation shafts on Saturday night. And in fact, I was the first to describe the B-2 bombers, the refueling, the entire mission with great accuracy. So I take issue with that.
Hegseth: I appreciate you acknowledging that this was the most successful mission, based on operational security, that this department has done since you&#8217;ve been here. I appreciate that. So, we&#8217;re looking at all aspects of intelligence and making sure we have a sense of what was what.</blockquote>
Hegseth got feisty with the media, and a lot of it was deserved. Some of the questions he was asked were absolutely ridiculous. He was asked by a reporter about the fact that he had suggested that it was “brave boys” who flew the plane when one of the people in the plane was a woman, and here was his response:
<blockquote>So when I say something like our boys and bombers, see, this is the kind of thing the press does, right? Of course. The chairman mentioned a female bomber pilot. That&#8217;s fantastic. She&#8217;s fantastic. She&#8217;s a hero. I want more female bomber pilots. I hope the men and women of our country sign up to do such brave and audacious things.
But when you spin it as, because I say “our boys,” — and bombers is a common phrase — I&#8217;ll keep saying things like that, whether they&#8217;re men or women. Very proud of that female pilot. Just like I&#8217;m very proud of those male pilots. And I don&#8217;t care if it&#8217;s a male or a female in that cockpit, and the American people don&#8217;t care. But it&#8217;s the obsession with race and gender in this department that&#8217;s changed priorities. And we don&#8217;t do that anymore. We don&#8217;t play your little games.</blockquote>
You could see how deeply, deeply annoyed Hegseth was along with the entire administration, having to explain that when you drop 12 bunker-busters on an Iranian nuclear site and destroy their nuclear facilities — or at the very least render them completely inoperable — and then the media lie about it and seek any speck of information to discredit that — it is deeply annoying.
And it should be deeply annoying. The media refuse to give President Trump the win he deeply deserves.
Simply put, they are trash.

Defense Sec. Pete Hegseth Holds Pentagon Press Conference On Iran Strikes

Hegseth Wrecks Trump-Hating Media

Department of Defense

Iran Airstrike

Legacy Media

Pentagon

Pete Hegseth

The Islamic Republic’s nuclear ambitions suffered a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-says-israeli-intel-confirms-total-obliteration-of-iranian-nuclear-sites">serious blow</a> last weekend but its hold over the Iranian people has only tightened. Mistaking tactical success in striking nuclear sites in Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan for strategic victory would only repeat decades of Western policy errors. Deterrence alone is insufficient without a clearly articulated policy of sustained pressure. Now is not the time for withdrawal.
The recent strikes were necessary but not regime-ending — they served as a tactical check. True deterrence requires sustained, visible consequences. The Islamic Republic is regrouping.
Abroad, Tehran didn’t just issue threats — it launched missiles at the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/iran-weighs-retaliation-against-us-strikes-nuclear-sites-2025-06-23/">U.S. base</a> in al-Udeid, Qatar. The regime also sent a <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/nightly-news/video/u-s-officials-iran-threatened-terror-attacks-inside-u-s-242058821681">warning</a> to the Trump administration via G7 intermediaries, threatening to activate sleeper cells on American soil. The Department of Homeland Security has placed regime-linked individuals under watch, while <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/us-urges-americans-sweden-remain-vigilant-citing-threat-attack-2025-06-23/">the State Department</a> confirmed Tehran is mobilizing operatives in Sweden to target Americans and Israelis — signaling its intent to export terror across the West.
At home, the regime has escalated repression, militarized cities, and launched an aggressive surveillance campaign. Inside Iran, fear dominates daily life. Armed IRGC <a href="https://x.com/RichardGrenell/status/1936771750106390725">checkpoints</a> every kilometer control movement. Phones are searched, homes raided, and civilians arrested without due process. The regime has executed dozens over the past several days — some accused of spreading protest videos, others targeted for mere association with opposition voices. These are not signs of strength — but symptoms of a regime in existential panic, terrified of its own population.
Compounding its repression, the regime <a href="https://www.fdd.org/in_the_news/2025/06/21/iranian-regime-launches-nationwide-internet-blackout/">imposed</a> an unprecedented information blackout. Internet access has been severed and landline usage severely restricted. Millions are sealed inside a controlled propaganda bubble, told only that Israel and America attacked without provocation. Cut off from truth and external leadership, Iranians face the regime’s lies alone.
Strategic clarity, not caution, must guide American policy now. This is not a call for American boots on Iranian soil but rather a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/a-tactical-trap-why-its-time-to-flip-the-script-on-iran?author=Aidin+Panahi&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=2&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=A+Tactical+Trap.+Why+It%E2%80%99s+Time+To+Flip+The+Script+On+Iran.">strategic opportunity</a> to amplify internal resistance, weaken the regime’s regional terror infrastructure, and shape Iran’s post-regime landscape to serve American and global interests.
First, Israel must have American diplomatic backing to continue surgical operations targeting IRGC facilities, cyberwarfare centers, and proxy command hubs in strategic locations in the Middle East. These strikes are stabilizing, not escalatory. Eliminating terror infrastructure strategically denies the regime asymmetric retaliation options, directly enhancing American and Israeli security.
Second, Washington must actively counter Tehran’s information warfare. The Iranian people cannot mobilize or resist oppression without access to truth. The Trump Administration and Congress should urgently authorize <a href="https://www.meforum.org/mef-observer/internet-access-can-complement-maximum-pressure-on-the-iranian-regime">satellite-based internet</a> coverage over Iran’s urban centers. This effort can be funded using Iran’s frozen assets — redirecting the regime’s own resources to empower its people. Under the existing Iran Human Rights and Democracy Promotion Act, Congress has both the legal authority and the moral obligation to provide these resources without delay.
Third, the U.S. and its allies must coalesce around a credible Iranian transitional figure to minimize post-collapse chaos. <a href="https://www.meforum.org/mef-observer/the-u-s-must-engage-with-reza-pahlavi">Reza Pahlavi</a>, whose consistent advocacy for secular democracy, human rights, and a national referendum has won respect among diverse Iranian demographics, offers exactly that credibility. Recognizing him publicly as part of a transitional governing council provides clarity to the Iranian opposition movement and stabilizes the inevitable regime transition.
For Americans who ask, &#8220;Why should we care?&#8221; — the answer is starkly evident. The Islamic Republic directly undermines American interests globally. It funds militias killing American servicemen in Iraq, orchestrates terror plots in Europe and Latin America, and destabilizes oil markets critical to U.S. economic security. A liberated Iran would cease destabilizing the Middle East, ending costly American military deployments aimed at containing Iranian aggression.
A free, stable Iran could emerge as a critical U.S. partner, anchoring stability in a troubled region rather than fueling its conflicts. No longer under IRGC control, Iran would abandon terror networks and normalize maritime trade in the Persian Gulf — directly enhancing global economic stability and reducing burdens on American naval forces.
President Trump’s decision to authorize precision strikes against Iran’s nuclear sites was strategically prudent and tactically effective. However, this is only the first step. The regime’s nuclear infrastructure is damaged, but its radical ideology and authoritarian apparatus remain firmly entrenched. America’s response should now be escalatory pressure, not premature diplomacy or concessions.
If America hesitates now, history proves the price of inaction: prolonged conflict, strengthened terror proxies, and sustained threats to regional stability. The regime has not been this vulnerable since the 1979 revolution. Failure to capitalize on this vulnerability would perpetuate instability, embolden Tehran’s hardliners, and sustain conflicts draining American resources.
America does not need to rebuild Iran; Iranians themselves will handle reconstruction. They simply require the opportunity. No more negotiations with a regime that systematically abuses human rights, supports terrorism, and openly mocks diplomatic engagement. A free Iran, aligned with Western values and open markets, would attract massive global investment — and American businesses will be among the first to benefit.
This strategy does not mean invasion or occupation. It represents coordinated external pressure combined with an internal Iranian awakening. Without deploying American troops, the United States can ignite the spark that ends one of the last ideological threats on earth.
Now is the time to finally make Iran great again — for the sake of freedom, regional stability, and American strategic dominance. A free Iran advances the MAGA agenda by eliminating a major source of global chaos. History will remember those who acted decisively when the regime was weakest and liberty was within reach.
* * *
Dr. Aidin Panahi is an Iranian-American research professor, energy expert, and political activist. He is the cofounder of the “From Boston to Iran” initiative and his analyses on security and policy issues have appeared in outlets including The Jerusalem Post, Washington Times, the Jerusalem Strategic Tribune, Middle East Forum, Homeland Security Today, and Visegrád24. X: @Aidin_FreeIran
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Daily Life In Kashmir, India

From Fordow To Freedom: A Strategy For Ending The Islamic Republic

Iran Nuclear

There was a bit of a têe-à-tête between Israel, Iran, and the United States that broke out on Tuesday morning.
Here&#8217;s what happened. Just before the ceasefire went into place, Iran fired a barrage of ballistic missiles into Israel. One of those ballistic missiles struck an apartment building in Beersheba (Be&#8217;er Sheva), which is in the south of Israel. At least seven people were murdered, 86 more people wounded, because this is what Iran does: target civilians, including women and children. Conversely, Israel, just before the ceasefire, took out a bunch of IRGC leaders at their headquarters.
Then the time for the ceasefire came. Israel stopped; Iran did not.
Iran instead sent a couple of missiles into northern Israel after the ceasefire, because this is what they always do. It’s not a shock; when Israel essentially wiped out Hezbollah in southern Lebanon back in October of 2024, and a ceasefire was declared, Hezbollah attempted a few actions violating the ceasefire just to see if they could get away with it.
So that is what Iran did.
And Israel prepared to fire back.
President Trump then went on Truth Social, writing:
<div class="image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-large wp-image-938977 aligncenter" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-24-at-4.42.08%E2%80%AFPM-1024x455.png" alt="" width="1024" height="455" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-24-at-4.42.08%E2%80%AFPM-1024x455.png 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-24-at-4.42.08%E2%80%AFPM-300x133.png 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-24-at-4.42.08%E2%80%AFPM-768x341.png 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-24-at-4.42.08%E2%80%AFPM.png 1212w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></div>
 
And then he had a rather heated exchange with a reporter talking about how upset he was that Israel and Iran were still firing at each other, essentially. He said:
<blockquote>They (Iran) violated it, but Israel violated it too. As soon as we made the deal, they came out and they dropped a load of bombs. The likes of which I&#8217;ve never seen before, the biggest load that we&#8217;ve seen. I&#8217;m not happy with Israel. You know, when I say, &#8220;Okay, now you have 12 hours,&#8221; you don&#8217;t go out in the first hour and just drop everything you have on them.
So I&#8217;m not happy with them. I&#8217;m not happy with Iran either, but I&#8217;m really unhappy if Israel is going out this morning because of one rocket that didn&#8217;t land that was shot, perhaps by mistake, that didn&#8217;t land. I&#8217;m not happy about that. You know what we have? We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don&#8217;t know what the f*** they’re doing. You understand that? Okay.</blockquote>
Then President Trump walked away. There are a lot of people on every side who got very upset with President Trump about this. I am not, and the reason I am not is because I think that he&#8217;s attempting to enforce the ceasefire: end of story. That&#8217;s what this is. The president is saying, “Everybody, it&#8217;s weapons down. It&#8217;s weapons down.”
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/bss-ep-2224-member-exclusive?elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=The+Ben+Shapiro+Show&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Carousel">WATCH: The Ben Shapiro Show</a></h3>
In fact, according to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu&#8217;s office, <a href="https://x.com/AmitSegal/status/1937487076343132584">this is actually how</a> it ended up materializing:
<blockquote>The ceasefire was set to begin at 07:00 this morning. At 03:00, Israel forcefully attacked in the heart of Tehran, struck regime targets and eliminated hundreds of Basij and Iranian security forces personnel. Shortly before the ceasefire took effect, Iran launched a barrage of missiles, one of which took the lives of four of our Israeli civilians in Be&#8217;er Sheva. The ceasefire took effect at 07:00. At 07:06, Iran launched one missile at Israeli territory, and two additional missiles at 10:25. These missiles were either intercepted or fell in open areas, causing neither casualties nor damage.
In response to Iran’s violations, the Air Force destroyed a radar installation near Tehran. Pursuant to the conversation between President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu, Israel has refrained from additional attacks. In the conversation, President Trump expressed his great appreciation for Israel, which achieved all of its objectives in this war, as well as his confidence in the stability of the ceasefire.</blockquote>
President Trump was simply saying to all parties, &#8220;Stop it now. We&#8217;re done.&#8221;
By the way, I don&#8217;t think it&#8217;s bad for Israel that President Trump is seen controlling the issue, because what that says to Iran is that if it were not for President Trump telling the Israelis to stop, those bombs would still be falling on your head. So cut that crap out right now.
That is the way I think President Trump meant for it to be read. And I think that&#8217;s the way that it will be read by Iran.
In fact, President Trump then came out within a couple of hours and put it on Truth Social: “IRAN WILL NEVER REBUILD THEIR NUCLEAR FACILITIES.” 
That came despite the fact that Tehran is openly vowing to restore its nuclear facilities. According to Iran&#8217;s nuclear chief, Mohammad Eslami, “The plan is to prevent interruptions in the process of production and services. Iran is assessing its damage to the nuclear industry following Israel&#8217;s intensive 12 Days campaign against it.” He also said that “arrangements are going to be made for its restoration.”
If President Trump identifies Iran rebuilding its nuclear facilities, he&#8217;s going to do something. And by the way, Israel will do something. They&#8217;re not going to sit idly by while Iran rebuilds any sort of nuclear capacity.
Here&#8217;s the bottom line: President Trump handled this situation better than any president of my lifetime. If you had told me at the beginning of this war that Israel would be able to do what it has done, that America, with effectively one B-2 sortie, would have been able to cripple Iran&#8217;s major nuclear facility at Fordow and also finish off Natanz and Esfahan in Iran — which, by the way, is what I suggested from the beginning of the war; that one B-2 flight is basically all that America would be required to do, and that would be it and then we&#8217;d get to the end of the war — I would have been stunned.
But it became true because President Trump lives in the world of reality. I can&#8217;t say this enough. He lives in the world of reality.
President Trump was never, ever going to get us into a nation-building project in Iran. For those who thought he would, have you met President Trump? Have you watched him for the last ten years?
What unbelievable lack of faith it showed in President Trump for people to suggest that Trump, of all people, was going to get us into World War III on a nation-building exercise in the Middle East.
Were they out of their damned minds?

King Willem-Alexander Of The Netherlands And Queen Maxima Invite Heads Of State And Government To A Dinner During The NATO Summit

Trump Draws The Line

Benjamin Netanyahu

President Trump Departs Washington For NATO Summit

It’s Time For America To Focus On Its Own Problems

It's Time For America To Focus On Its Own Problems

America First

Foreign Policy

Matt Walsh

NEW YORK (Reuters) — Wall Street advanced on Tuesday as investors welcomed a fragile truce with Israel and Iran while parsing Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell&#8217;s congressional <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/jerome-powell-suggests-delaying-rate-cuts-beyond-july-meeting-while-fed-studies-tariff-impact">testimony</a> for clues regarding the U.S. central bank&#8217;s path forward.
All three major U.S. stock indexes were on track for their second straight session of solid gains following U.S. missile strikes on Iran&#8217;s uranium enrichment assets.
The benchmark S&amp;P 500 was less than 1% below its all-time closing high reached on February 19.
Late Monday, U.S. President Donald Trump announced a ceasefire agreement, but then on Tuesday, the president <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-holds-ceasefire-after-israel-refrains-from-major-retaliation-for-irans-strike-on-civilians">stepped in</a> to urge Israel to stand down on a retaliatory attack on Iran after Iran killed at least four people in an attack in southern Israel targeting civilians just before the ceasefire went into effect.
Still, investors viewed the ceasefire as a sign of de-escalating tensions.
&#8220;The market has learned very precisely over the last generation that any time there’s a geopolitical flare-up in the Middle East that affects U.S. financial markets, those effects will be short-lived,&#8221; said Scott Ladner, chief investment officer at Horizon in Charlotte, North Carolina.
&#8220;The ceasefire is just cementing that view,&#8221; Ladner added.
Crude prices slid on waning supply concerns related to the conflict, dragging energy shares lower.
Powell, speaking before the U.S. House of Representatives Financial Services Committee, reiterated his view that rate cuts can wait until the economic effects of tariff increases are better known, adding &#8220;we are well positioned to wait to learn more about the likely course of the economy before considering any adjustments to our policy stance.&#8221;
Financial markets have been pricing in a more than 20% likelihood that the Fed will lower its key interest rate at the conclusion of its upcoming July policy meeting, and a near 70% probability that its first rate cut will land in September.
&#8220;We think September&#8217;s very likely and we think while July is not a zero probability event, it&#8217;s definitely a long shot,&#8221; Ladner said.
On the economic front, Consumer Confidence deteriorated this month, with pessimism toward the jobs market falling to its lowest level since March 2021.
The Commerce Department is expected to release its final take on first-quarter GDP on Thursday, and on Friday its closely watched Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) report will shed light on inflation, consumer spending and income growth.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 513.96 points, or 1.21%, to 43,095.74, the S&amp;P 500 gained 71.64 points, or 1.19%, to 6,096.94, and the Nasdaq Composite gained 305.28 points, or 1.56%, to 19,936.25.
Among the 11 major sectors of the S&amp;P 500, Tech shares led the gainers, while energy stocks were the sole decliners.
Among megacap stocks, Tesla shares shed 2.0%.
Airline stocks gained altitude amid cooling Middle East tensions. The S&amp;P 1500 Airlines index advanced 2.3%.
But defense stocks lost ground, with Lockheed Martin and RTX Corp both off about 2.9%.
Shares of crypto companies rose after bitcoin hit a one-week high. Coinbase Global and Strategy advanced 11.7% and 3.8% respectively.
Broadcom touched a record high, after HSBC raised the semiconductor manufacturer to &#8220;buy&#8221; from &#8220;hold&#8221;. The stock was last up 3.4%.
Package delivery firm FedEx is expected to report quarterly results after the closing bell.
Advancing issues outnumbered decliners by a 3.38-to-1 ratio on the NYSE. There were 195 new highs and 49 new lows on the NYSE.
On the Nasdaq, 3,430 stocks rose and 1,007 fell as advancing issues outnumbered decliners by a 3.41-to-1 ratio.
The S&amp;P 500 posted 18 new 52-week highs and no new lows while the Nasdaq Composite recorded 109 new highs and 49 new lows.
(Reporting by Stephen Culp; Additional reporting by Kanchana Chakravarty in Bengaluru; Editing by David Gregorio)

Traders work on the floor of the NYSE in New York

Wall Street Rallies, S&P 500 Nears Record High As Middle East Tensions Cool

Economy

Stock Market

Wall Street

Israel’s audacious strikes on Iran’s nuclear and military sites, swiftly followed by U.S. precision attacks on the same infrastructure, have decisively targeted the heart of Iran’s nuclear ambitions, exposing the grave threat they pose. Yet, astonishingly, many on America’s left are waving Iranian flags in the streets, while misinformed citizens and members of Congress flood social media, decrying the U.S. strikes as unnecessary and escalatory. 
Allow me to explain why they’re wrong and why Iran’s relentless pursuit of nuclear weapons left Israel and the United States with no choice but to act … and act decisively.
A state of hostility has existed between Israel and Iran for almost 45 years, ever since the 1979 Iranian Revolution. As a result, “Death to Israel” has been not merely a slogan, but the goal of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
On June 13, 2025, Israel launched Operation Rising Lion, a massive wave of attacks within Iran, carried out by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Israel’s Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations (Mossad). The target: Iran’s nuclear and military installations.
Why did Israel take such bold preemptive action? Why were Israel’s leaders convinced that Iran’s nuclear program threatened the very existence of the Jewish State?
Few Westerners understand how the tensions between Iran and Israel have largely been driven by the fanatical theological beliefs of Iran’s ruling elite. We need to understand why Shiite Islam — the dominant belief system of Iran — makes Cold War models of nuclear deterrence obsolete.
Islam is not a monolithic faith, neither is Christianity. Much of Christianity is divided into Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox branches, while Islam is also deeply divided — most significantly between Sunnis and Shiites. The divisions within Islam, however, are far more violent than any disagreements within present-day Christianity, and have produced centuries of war and death.
The schisms within Islam date back to the death of Muhammad in AD 632, when a dispute arose over who should lead the Muslim community. Sunnis supported Abu Bakr, a companion of Muhammad. Shiites backed Muhammad’s son-in-law, Ali. This dispute produced a violent split that has raged for nearly fourteen centuries.
The defining moment in Shiite history was the martyrdom of Hussein, the grandson of Muhammad, at the Battle of Karbala in AD 680. Hussein was killed by forces loyal to the Sunni-dominated Umayyad Caliphate. To Shiites, Karbala still symbolizes righteous resistance against oppression and false doctrine. Some Shia movements consider themselves divinely appointed minorities struggling against corrupt Sunni majorities. Shiites comprise only 10 to 15% of the Muslim world. Iran, however, has been a Shiite stronghold since 1501, when the Safavid dynasty declared Twelver Shiism the state religion of Persia. Twelver Shiism is centered on the belief in the Twelfth Imam (the Mahdi). According to Twelver belief, there were twelve Imams (rightful successors to Muhammad, all from Ali’s lineage). The twelfth was Muhammad al-Mahdi, who supposedly went into occultation (miraculous hiddenness) as a child in the 9th century. Twelvers believe the Twelfth Imam is still alive and will one day come forth to impose Islamic rule over the world.
Here’s where Iran’s present-day nuclear doctrines meet Iran’s ancient theological doctrines: Some factions within Iran’s clerical leadership believe that the Mahdi’s return will be hastened by global destruction and war. These radical scholars teach that apocalyptic war is a necessary requirement for the Mahdi to be revealed. In this view, Iran’s struggle against Israel and Western civilization is part of a divine plan for return of the Mahdi.
This theological doctrine makes a nuclear-armed Iran unthinkably dangerous. During the Cold War, the logic of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) kept nuclear superpowers from attacking each other, because any nuclear attack would invite annihilation.
But if Iran’s leaders believe that nuclear war would hasten the return of a long-prophesied messiah-figure, they would actually be highly motivated to start a nuclear war, regardless of the consequences. Iran’s apocalyptic clerics have a powerful incentive to pull the nuclear trigger — the fulfillment of ancient prophecies and the establishment of a global caliphate.
Do Iran’s leaders really dream of launching a nuclear war?
In October 2003, Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, issued a fatwa (religious ruling) declaring nuclear weapons un-Islamic and forbidden. The Iranian government has repeatedly cited this fatwa and claimed that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only.
Western analysts, however, are skeptical of Iran’s claims.
Peaceful nuclear technologies (for power plants or nuclear medicine) require low-enriched uranium containing no more than 20% of isotope uranium-235. Most commercial nuclear power plants use only 2 to 4% uranium-235. But Iran is enriching uranium to levels above 60%, far beyond any “peaceful” use of nuclear energy. According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iran has amassed enough highly enriched uranium to assemble nine nuclear warheads. This troubling development has prompted Israel to eliminate the threat of Iran’s nuclear program.
While not all Iranian leaders believe they can hasten the Mahdi’s return through war, the prevalence of such views within Tehran threatens to transform the Middle East into a nuclear hellscape. That is why Western and Israeli policymakers must take theology into account as they assess the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran.
In these uncertain days, Christians around the world must unite in prayer. We easily forget that there are many Christian believers in Iran right now, suffering intense persecution. We must pray for their strength and safety and for God to give the Iranian and the Israeli people wisdom for the days ahead. Pray also that, in this time of war, God will turn many hearts back to Him.
* * *
Michael A. Youssef, Ph.D., born in Egypt, is senior pastor of Church of The Apostles in Atlanta and founder of the radio broadcast “Leading The Way,” reaching 190 countries. With degrees from Moore College, Fuller Theological Seminary, and Emory University, he’s authored over 50 books, including “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/1496431502/?bestFormat=true&amp;k=the%20third%20jihad%20by%20michael%20youssef&amp;ref_=nb_sb_ss_w_scx-ent-pd-bk-d_de_k0_1_16&amp;crid=385NJPDUXR79B&amp;sprefix=the%20third%20jihad%20" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Third Jihad</a>.” He’s appeared on Fox News, CBN, and in The Wall Street Journal. His new book, “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Gods-Final-Call-Revelation-Ultimate/dp/1496486374/?_encoding=UTF8&amp;pd_rd_w=GjEWG&amp;content-id=amzn1.sym.0fb2cce1-1ca4-439a-844b-8ad0b1fb77f7&amp;pf_rd_p=0fb2cce1-1ca4-439a-844b-8ad0b1fb77f7&amp;pf_rd_r=133-8344803-2786917&amp;pd_rd_wg=m8gZy&amp;pd_rd_r=251a523a-31f1-47f0-9867-3168baa1d786&amp;ref_=aufs_ap_sc_dsk" target="_blank" rel="noopener">God’s Final Call: How the Book of Revelation Pulls Back the Veil on Current Events and Our Ultimate Future</a>” (Tyndale, March 2025), recently released.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Slogan denouncing the USA on the former US Embassy in Tehran, Iran – April 25, 2017

Iran’s Nuclear Theology: Why Israel, U.S. Had No Choice

Christianity

Islam

President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that he&#8217;s not pushing for regime change in Iran after bombing three of the country&#8217;s nuclear facilities over the weekend before working out a ceasefire agreement between Iran and Israel.
Asked by a reporter on Air Force One if he wants a regime change, Trump replied, &#8220;No. If there was, there was. But no, I don&#8217;t want it.&#8221; The president&#8217;s comments come shortly after he called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and asked him <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-holds-ceasefire-after-israel-refrains-from-major-retaliation-for-irans-strike-on-civilians?topStoryPosition=undefined&amp;author=Zach+Jewell&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=1&amp;row=1&amp;rowHeadline=Top+Stories&amp;rowType=Top+Stories&amp;title=Trump+Holds+Ceasefire+After+Israel+Refrains+From+Major+Retaliation+For+Iran%E2%80%99s+Strike+On+Civilians">to hold off</a> on a retaliatory strike on Iran Tuesday morning following a ceasefire agreement.
&#8220;I&#8217;d like to see everything calm down as quickly as possible,&#8221; Trump added. &#8220;Regime change takes chaos, and ideally, we don&#8217;t want to see so much chaos. &#8230; You know, the Iranians are very good traders, very good business people, and they&#8217;ve got a lot of oil. They should be fine. They should be able to rebuild and do a good job.&#8221;
&#8220;They&#8217;re never going to have nuclear, but other than that, they should do a great job,&#8221; he continued.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
.<a href="https://twitter.com/POTUS?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@POTUS</a> on Iran: &quot;Regime change takes chaos — and ideally, we don&#39;t want to see so much chaos.&quot; <a href="https://t.co/Tr56V91gRM">pic.twitter.com/Tr56V91gRM</a>
&mdash; Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) <a href="https://twitter.com/RapidResponse47/status/1937521250886385893?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 24, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Trump appears to be using these policy pronouncements as part of his negotiations with Iran. On Sunday, as Trump was working to get Iran to the negotiating table, he floated regime change in Iran, writing on Truth Social, “It’s not politically correct to use the term, ‘regime change,’ but if the current Iranian regime is unable to MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN, why wouldn’t there be a regime change?”
His statement against regime change now comes as he&#8217;s working to ensure Iran sticks to the ceasefire.
Shortly before a ceasefire between Israel and Iran went into effect Tuesday morning, however, Israel launched a massive attack on Iran, taking out &#8220;hundreds of Basij members and Iranian security personnel,&#8221; according to Netanyahu&#8217;s office. Iran then fired missiles at civilians in Beersheva, Israel, taking out a large apartment building and killing at least four people. The Ayatollah then violated the ceasefire by firing two rockets toward northern Israel, which were shot down.
Earlier on Tuesday, Trump <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-holds-ceasefire-after-israel-refrains-from-major-retaliation-for-irans-strike-on-civilians?topStoryPosition=undefined&amp;author=Zach+Jewell&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=1&amp;row=1&amp;rowHeadline=Top+Stories&amp;rowType=Top+Stories&amp;title=Trump+Holds+Ceasefire+After+Israel+Refrains+From+Major+Retaliation+For+Iran%E2%80%99s+Strike+On+Civilians">told</a> reporters at the White House, “We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the f*** they’re doing.” He also accused both Iran and Israel of violating the “complete and total ceasefire” that was agreed to on Monday. Trump later called Netanyahu and gave him a “firm and clear” message, urging him to back down from a retaliatory strike on Iran.
Trump said that Israel’s planes would only conduct a “friendly ‘Plane Wave’ to Iran. Nobody will be hurt, the Ceasefire is in effect!”
“ISRAEL is not going to attack Iran. All planes will turn around and head home …” Trump added.
Israel’s “friendly plane wave” appeared to be an airstrike on a small target north of Tehran. Israeli officials said that their pilots struck a radar installation in Iran, according to Israeli journalist Amit Segal.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
The target that was hit was a radar installation <a href="https://t.co/6T54ORXuwm">https://t.co/6T54ORXuwm</a>
&mdash; Amit Segal (@AmitSegal) <a href="https://twitter.com/AmitSegal/status/1937476246742663414?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 24, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Donald Trump/Iran

Trump Walks Back Regime Change Talk: ‘Don’t Want To See So Much Chaos’

Ceasefire

Executive

Global Politics

Politics

Israel appeared to back off a major retaliatory strike on Iran on Tuesday at President Donald Trump&#8217;s request after Iran targeted civilians in a missile attack on Israel just before the ceasefire went into effect, and then fired more missiles at Israel in violation of the ceasefire.
Israel reportedly had warplanes ready to strike Iran, but backed down after Trump <a href="https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114737953503348541">told</a> them, &#8220;DO NOT DROP THOSE BOMBS. IF YOU DO IT IS A MAJOR VIOLATION. BRING YOUR PILOTS HOME, NOW!&#8221; Around an hour later, Trump said that Israel&#8217;s planes would only conduct a &#8220;friendly &#8216;Plane Wave&#8217; to Iran. Nobody will be hurt, the Ceasefire is in effect!&#8221;
&#8220;ISRAEL is not going to attack Iran. All planes will turn around and head home &#8230;&#8221; Trump <a href="https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114738104789842114">added</a>.
All the communication didn&#8217;t happen over social media. Both Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu confirm they spoke, and the message was &#8220;firm and clear.&#8221;
The Israeli prime minister&#8217;s office <a href="https://x.com/AmitSegal/status/1937487076343132584">said</a> in a statement, &#8220;Following a phone call between President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu, Israel refrained from carrying out additional strikes. During the conversation, President Trump conveyed his deep appreciation for Israel, which he said had accomplished all of the war’s objectives. The president also expressed confidence in the stability of the ceasefire.&#8221;
A senior U.S. official <a href="https://x.com/n12news/status/1937488755235180767?s=46&amp;t=o-U3qwC25WnWaylJ0oeG7Q">told</a> The New York Times that Trump was &#8220;firm and clear&#8221; in his conversation with Netanyahu and &#8220;the Prime Minister understood the gravity of the situation.&#8221;
Israel&#8217;s &#8220;friendly plane wave&#8221; appeared to be an airstrike on a small <a href="https://x.com/AmitSegal/status/1937474638306754889">target</a> north of Tehran. Israeli officials said that their pilots struck a radar installation in Iran, and the planes were on their way home, according to Israeli journalist Amit Segal.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
The target that was hit was a radar installation <a href="https://t.co/6T54ORXuwm">https://t.co/6T54ORXuwm</a>
— Amit Segal (@AmitSegal) <a href="https://twitter.com/AmitSegal/status/1937476246742663414?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 24, 2025</a></blockquote>
Shortly before the ceasefire went into effect Tuesday morning, Israel bombed Iran, &#8220;eliminating hundreds of Basij members and Iranian security personnel,&#8221; according to the prime minister&#8217;s office. Iran then hit Israel with another attack targeting civilians in Beersheva just before the ceasefire went into effect. At least four people were killed in the strike, and 20 people were wounded.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said that Iran then violated the ceasefire with another missile attack, as two missiles were <a href="https://apnews.com/article/israel-iran-trump-ceasefire-attacks-continue-f1e60190722cc3410b69f21717872ffa">reportedly</a> intercepted over northern Israel.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
🚨WATCH: The scene of the direct hit from a drone view <a href="https://t.co/t0XpcbZbEE">https://t.co/t0XpcbZbEE</a> <a href="https://t.co/pwpOYaMUOH">pic.twitter.com/pwpOYaMUOH</a>
— Raylan Givens (@JewishWarrior13) <a href="https://twitter.com/JewishWarrior13/status/1937443131827609600?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 24, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Earlier on Tuesday, Trump told reporters at the White House, &#8220;We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don&#8217;t know what the f*** they&#8217;re doing.&#8221; He also accused both Iran and Israel of violating the &#8220;complete and total <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-trump-announces-complete-and-total-ceasefire-between-israel-and-iran?topStoryPosition=undefined&amp;author=Kassy+Akiva&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=3&amp;row=1&amp;rowHeadline=Top+Stories&amp;rowType=Top+Stories&amp;title=BREAKING%3A+Trump+Announces+%E2%80%98Complete+And+Total+Ceasefire%E2%80%99+Between+Israel+and+Iran">ceasefire</a>&#8221; that was agreed to on Monday.
Israel&#8217;s retaliatory strike on the Iranian radar installation appeared to be a major step back from what it was planning. Katz said that he, along with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, initially instructed the Israel Defense Forces to &#8220;forcefully&#8221; strike back at Iran.
&#8220;I have instructed the IDF, in coordination with the Prime Minister, to respond forcefully to the violation of the ceasefire by Iran through intense strikes against regime targets in the heart of Tehran,&#8221; Katz said.
Israeli Chief of General Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir echoed, “In light of the serious ceasefire violation committed by the Iranian regime &#8211; we will attack with force.”

Trump Holds Ceasefire After Israel Refrains From Major Retaliation For Iran’s Strike On Civilians

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