On Friday, Barack Obama held a live webcast with a group of Jewish communal leaders. The purported aim was to assuage concerns about the deal with Iran, but Jonathan Tobin sees in the president’s remarks only more of the usual attacks on opponents, refusal to recognize opposing arguments, and “unmatched . . . ḥutzpah”:

[T]he real problem remains the disingenuous spin [President Obama] uses to defend a deal that fails to achieve the objective that he set for the negotiations when they began: to end the nuclear threat from Iran. He claims to be only arguing from facts, but at the core of his spin are two indefensible notions: a dismissal of the concerns of Israel and its friends as being “visceral,” [as opposed to] his supposedly rational stance, and a refusal to acknowledge that Iran is not planning to change and that the deal doesn’t give the U.S. the ability to do much to stop it from getting a bomb when it expires. . . .

[A]lthough the ostensible purpose of the webcast was to soothe relations with an angry and divided Jewish community, Obama stuck to his talking points and refused to acknowledge that he is even partially responsible for injecting a toxic tone into the debate while delegitimizing his critics. . . .

The president’s trademark sophistry was on display when in one sentence he claimed he had never called anyone a warmonger but then in the next went on to claim falsely that the only alternative to his policies is war. Though he claims that he only argues from logic, his dismissal of the claim that tougher sanctions had the potential to get a better deal was completely illogical. After all, Obama opposed the sanctions that brought Iran to the table. Just as the world was forced, reluctantly, to follow the U.S. on the issue before, it could [be forced to] do so again.

On Tuesday, a Hizballah drone attack injured three people in northern Israel. The next day, another attack, targeting an IDF base, injured eighteen people, six of them seriously, in Arab al-Amshe, also in the north. This second attack involved the simultaneous use of drones carrying explosives and guided antitank missiles. In both cases, the defensive systems that performed so successfully last weekend failed to stop the drones and missiles. Ron Ben-Yishai has a straightforward explanation as to why: the Lebanon-backed terrorist group is getting better at evading Israel defenses. He explains the three basis systems used to pilot these unmanned aircraft, and their practical effects:

These systems allow drones to act similarly to fighter jets, using “dead zones”—areas not visible to radar or other optical detection—to approach targets. They fly low initially, then ascend just before crashing and detonating on the target. The terrain of southern Lebanon is particularly conducive to such attacks.

But this requires skills that the terror group has honed over months of fighting against Israel. The latest attacks involved a large drone capable of carrying over 50 kg (110 lbs.) of explosives. The terrorists have likely analyzed Israel’s alert and interception systems, recognizing that shooting down their drones requires early detection to allow sufficient time for launching interceptors.

The IDF tries to detect any incoming drones on its radar, as it had done prior to the war. Despite Hizballah’s learning curve, the IDF’s technological edge offers an advantage. However, the military must recognize that any measure it takes is quickly observed and analyzed, and even the most effective defenses can be incomplete. The terrain near the Lebanon-Israel border continues to pose a challenge, necessitating technological solutions and significant financial investment.