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      Harris Must Persuade Gaza Protesters, Not Dismiss Them

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      At a campaign rally in the Detroit area on Wednesday, Kamala Harris was speaking about the threat of Project 2025 and the Trump agenda when a small group of protesters interrupted her. I couldn’t make out their words, but it was reported that they were shouting something about Gaza. Harris reacted with her trademark “I am speaking now.” The protesters persisted. Harris’s tone grew stern. “You know what?” she said. “If you want Donald Trump to win, then say that. Otherwise, I’m speaking.” She continued, to cheers from the crowd. The protesters were escorted out.When I watched a video of this scene, my heart sank. It reminded me of another interruption, at a Democratic fund-raiser at a nightclub in New York, 32 years ago. Bill Clinton was speaking when Bob Rafsky, a member of the AIDS activist group ACT UP, stood up to challenge him on his plans to deal with the AIDS epidemic. “We’re dying,” Rafsky said. Clinton engaged at first, saying he was running for president “to do something about it.” Rafsky continued to shout. Clinton became angry. “Would you just calm down?” he said.I knew Rafsky. I was a member of ACT UP, and a journalist covering AIDS in the gay press. When Clinton said, “Calm down,” I heard, Some things are more important than your life. In campaign math, this was probably true: Only a fraction of a percent of Americans were living with AIDS. Clinton had statistically bigger issues to address.Yes, before her Detroit speech, Harris met very briefly with a group of pro-Palestinian activists. But at the rally, I heard the same steely political calculus in Harris’s admonition to the protesters: She has to focus on beating Trump, not on a genocide occurring 6,000 miles away and affecting about two million people, some of whom are related to or have close ties with a small fraction of the American electorate for which the war in Gaza is a decisive issue in this election. And, like people confronting AIDS in 1992, Palestinian Americans and others who want an end to Israel’s war should know that the other candidate would be even worse.Such reasoning is as statistically sound as it is tone-deaf and emotionally blind. It appears that at least one of the protesters at the rally is of Palestinian descent. And given the demographics of the Detroit area, it is quite likely that others in the crowd were Palestinian Americans, very possibly with family and friends in Gaza who are at risk of being killed, whether by bombing, disease or starvation in the coming months, if they are not dead already.Rafsky died in February 1993, one month into the first Clinton administration. In November 1992, on the eve of the presidential election, he gave a speech standing by the coffin of another ACT UP member, Mark Fisher, who had asked that his body be carried through the streets of New York in protest.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Israel Launches Another Offensive in Gaza’s South Amid Push for Truce

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      The United States, Egypt and Qatar are trying to restart peace talks between Hamas and Israel, while Israel carries on its operation in Gaza and braces for attacks by Iran and Hezbollah.An Israeli ground assault in the southern Gaza Strip on Friday forced tens of thousands of Palestinians to flee their homes and shelters, many for a third time or more, even as the United States and some Arab allies pressed both Israel and Hamas to restart peace talks.Between 60,000 and 70,000 people had fled by Thursday evening after the Israeli military ordered people in the city of Khan Younis to leave, according to UNRWA, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees. More continued to flee into the night and into Friday.The Israeli military said its troops were “engaged in combat both above and below-ground” in the Khan Younis area, in an attack involving ground troops, fighter jets, helicopter gunships and paratroopers, and that the air force had struck more than 30 targets. The assault, the military said, was “part of the effort to degrade” Hamas’ capabilities “as they attempt to regroup.”Under a blazing sun, women carrying babies and blankets, men pushing carts and wheelchairs over sandy roads and young children carrying suitcases and backpacks have walked away from homes and shelters and toward unknown destinations. Some were in tears.“People are sleeping in the streets. Children and women are on the ground without mattresses,” Yafa Abu Aker, a resident of Khan Younis and an independent journalist, told The New York Times in a text message.“Death is better,” an older woman said on Thursday, in video from the Reuters news agency. “We’re fed up. We’ve already died. We’re dead.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Can Harris Win Back Arab American Voters? The Door May Be Cracked Open.

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      Vice President Kamala Harris has not strayed from President Biden on Israel policy, but she has taken a stronger tone on the suffering of Palestinians.In Muna Jondy’s family, every topic is fair game on the WhatsApp thread.The 40-person chat, which includes Ms. Jondy’s brothers, sisters, nieces and nephews, discusses everything: the Drake and Kendrick Lamar rivalry, Ohio State-Michigan football superiority and, of course, politics.The discussion of President Biden’s re-election campaign was a common theme this year as the administration’s support for Israel in the war in Gaza alienated many Muslim and Arab American families, including the Jondys.But the mood shifted when Mr. Biden dropped out of the race and Vice President Kamala Harris became the presumptive Democratic nominee. The family took notice last week when Ms. Harris said she would not look away from images of dead children or be silent about the tragedies in Gaza.“Am I crazy or is this way more than Biden ever was willing to say?” Ms. Jondy’s niece messaged the group. Others in the chat were more skeptical: “Would be nice, but unless I see an explicit change in policy I won’t believe it.”The WhatsApp chat is typical of the conversations happening among Arab Americans across the country who turned away from Mr. Biden over the war in Gaza, which has killed more than 36,000 people over the past 10 months. In crucial battleground states like Michigan, where Ms. Jondy’s family lives, many people who voted for Mr. Biden in 2020 said they felt betrayed and joined protest movements that challenged his campaign.Ms. Harris may have an opportunity to change the conversation. While she has not strayed from Mr. Biden on Israel policy since she began her own campaign for the presidency, she has struck a stronger tone on the suffering of Palestinians.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Shapiro’s College-Era Criticism of Palestinians Draws Fresh Scrutiny

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      Gov. Josh Shapiro, Democrat of Pennsylvania, wrote in his college newspaper three decades ago that Palestinians were “too battle-minded” to achieve a two-state solution in the Middle East, prompting criticism as Vice President Kamala Harris considers him to be her running mate.Mr. Shapiro, 51, has embraced his Jewish identity and been one of the Democratic Party’s staunchest defenders of Israel at a moment when the party is splintered over the war in Gaza.But he says his views have evolved since publishing an opinion essay as a college student at the University of Rochester in New York, when he wrote that Palestinians were incapable of establishing their own homeland and making it successful, even with help from Israel and the United States.“They are too battle-minded to be able to establish a peaceful homeland of their own,” he wrote in the essay, published in the Sept. 23, 1993, edition of The Campus Times, the student newspaper. “They will grow tired of fighting amongst themselves and will turn outside against Israel.”Mr. Shapiro, who was 20 at the time, noted in his essay that he had spent five months studying in Israel and had volunteered in the Israeli Army.“The only way the ‘peace plan’ will be successful is if the Palestinians do not ruin it,” Mr. Shapiro wrote, adding, “Palestinians will not coexist peacefully.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Iran’s Options for Retaliation Risk Escalating Middle East Crisis

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      The killing of Hamas’s political leader in Tehran was a humiliating security failure for the Iranian government.Most new Iranian presidents have months to settle into the decades-old cadence of gradual nuclear escalation, attacks against adversaries and, episodically, secret talks with the West to relieve sanctions.President Masoud Pezeshkian had 10 hours.That was the elapsed time between his swearing-in and the explosion inside an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps guesthouse, at 2 a.m. in Tehran, that killed Ismail Haniyeh, the longtime political leader of Hamas. Mr. Haniyeh had not only attended the swearing-in, but had also been embraced by the new president and met that day with the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, making the assassination a particularly brazen act.Now Mr. Pezeshkian — along with Ayatollah Khamenei and top military generals — will be immersed in critical choices that may determine whether war breaks out between two of the Mideast’s most potent militaries. He spent his first day in office in national security meetings. The final decision on how to retaliate rests with Mr. Khamenei and on Wednesday he where ordered Iranian forces to strike Israel directly for what appeared to be its role in killing Mr. Haniyeh.But how that retaliation unfolds makes a difference. If Iran launches direct missile attacks, as it attempted for the first time in 45 years in April, the cycle of strike and counterstrike could easily escalate. If Hezbollah, its closest ally in the region, steps up attacks on Israel’s north or the Houthis expand their attacks in the Red Sea, the war could expand to Lebanon, or involve the need for American naval forces to keep the sea lanes open.Mourners for Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s longtime political leader, in Tehran on Wednesday.Arash Khamooshi for The New York TimesBehind all of those options is perhaps the riskiest choice of all: whether Iran decides to take the final step toward building an actual nuclear weapon. For decades it has walked right up to the line, producing nuclear fuel and in recent years enriching it to near bomb-grade levels. But American intelligence assessments say the country has always stopped short of an actual weapon, a decision Iranian leaders have publicly been reconsidering in recent months.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      After Haniyeh’s Death, Who Are Hamas’s Most Prominent Leaders?

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      Ismail Haniyeh, who was killed on Wednesday in Iran, was among the most senior members of Hamas’s leadership, a group that is tightly coordinated despite being scattered inside and outside Gaza.Hamas’s leaders, especially those in Gaza, have repeatedly been targets of Israeli assassination attempts, but the group has swiftly replaced those who have been killed.The group’s leadership structure is often opaque, but here is a look at what we know about some of Hamas’s most prominent leaders who are either believed to be alive or whose fate is unclear.Yahya Sinwar, the head of Hamas in GazaMr. Sinwar helped establish Hamas in the late 1980s around the time of a Palestinian uprising against Israeli rule. He was arrested by the Israeli authorities several times, spending over 20 years in Israeli prison until he was released in a prisoner exchange in 2011.After rising through Hamas’s ranks, he was elected its leader in Gaza in 2017. Israeli officials said that he was one of the leaders who had masterminded the Oct. 7 attack, alongside Mohammed Deif, the commander of Hamas’s military wing in Gaza, and Marwan Issa, the deputy commander, who was killed in an Israeli strike in March. Mr. Sinwar is believed to be hiding in the group’s tunnel network beneath Gaza.A number of Hamas’s leaders in Gaza, including Mr. Sinwar, are seen as more radical than Mr. Haniyeh, the leader who was killed in Iran. The death of Mr. Haniyeh, who was considered a relatively pragmatic counterpoint, “will make a cease-fire much more difficult to achieve,” said Hugh Lovatt, a senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Israel Says It Killed Hezbollah Commander in Airstrike Near Beirut

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      The strike was in retaliation for a deadly rocket attack this weekend in the Golan Heights. At least three civilians were killed and 74 others wounded on Tuesday, Lebanese officials said.Israel launched a deadly strike in a densely populated Beirut suburb on Tuesday in retaliation for a rocket attack in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights that it blamed Hezbollah for and that killed 12 children and teenagers on a soccer field.The target of the Israeli strike in a southern suburb of Lebanon’s capital was Fuad Shukr, a senior official who serves as a close adviser to Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, according to three Israeli security officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details.The Israel Defense Forces later said in a statement that its fighter jets had “eliminated” Mr. Shukr, but there was no confirmation from Hezbollah, the powerful Iran-backed group, and the claim could not be independently verified.Hezbollah has denied carrying out the attack in the Golan Heights on Saturday. The latest strikes were likely to fuel concerns that Israel’s long-running conflict with the group could escalate into a full-blown war even as Israel wages a military offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip after that group led a deadly assault in Israel on Oct. 7.The attack on Tuesday is believed to be the first time since the war with Hamas began that Israel has targeted Hezbollah in Beirut. In January, an Israeli airstrike in a Beirut suburb killed Saleh al-Arouri, a senior leader of Hamas, which is also backed by Iran.The strike on Tuesday killed at least three other people — a woman and two children — and wounded at least 74 others, five critically, according to Lebanon’s Ministry of Health. Officials were still searching the rubble for other victims, the ministry said. More

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      Netanyahu Vows ‘Severe’ Response to Deadly Rocket Attack Tied to Hezbollah

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      Fears linger among Lebanese civilians after a strike killed 12 children and teenagers in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights.Tensions were high on both sides of the Israeli-Lebanese border on Monday as Israeli leaders vowed to deliver a significant military blow against the armed group Hezbollah in response to a deadly rocket attack over the weekend.The attack on Saturday killed 12 children and teenagers in the Druse Arab village of Majdal Shams in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights.Hezbollah, an Iran-backed militia that dominates southern Lebanon and that has been firing rockets into Israel for months, denied responsibility for the strike. But Israel and the United States blamed the group, saying it was Hezbollah’s rocket that had been fired from territory it controls.Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who visited the site of the attack on Monday, said, “Our response is coming, and it will be severe.” Local residents heckled Mr. Netanyahu, telling him they had no security and chanting, “Murderer! Murderer!” videos posted on social media showed.Mr. Netanyahu’s visit to Majdal Shams came the morning after Israeli cabinet ministers authorized him and Israel’s defense minister, Yoav Gallant, to determine the nature and timing of the military response. The strike and Israel’s expected counterattack have raised fears that nearly 10 months of armed conflict between Israel and Hezbollah could spiral into an all-out war.Hezbollah began firing rockets, antitank missiles and drones into Israel in solidarity with Hamas after that group, which is also backed by Iran, led the deadly Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More