Early this week, the New Zealand-born pop singer who goes by the name Lorde announced that she is canceling her concert in Tel Aviv scheduled for next year. She claims to have been persuaded by “an overwhelming number of messages and letters” and “a lot of discussions with people holding many views.” She has, however, no plans to cancel upcoming concerts in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Liel Leibovitz comments:

Lorde is a talented young woman, and I admire her music as well as her commitment to her principles. Provided, of course, that they are principles and not craven submission to bigots who cunningly market their noxious hatred as a fashionable ideological accessory. How do we tell the difference? Simple: if Lorde is truly committed to the principles she now espouses, she should announce her refusal to perform in, or return home to, her native New Zealand, a country that is guilty, in spades, of the crimes BDS supporters falsely attribute to Israelis.

Is Lorde a foe of colonial occupation? She should know, then, that in 1831, fewer than 1,000 Europeans were living in New Zealand, foreigners vastly outnumbered by the local Maori tribes. Fifty years later, that number skyrocketed to a half-million, courtesy of British policy that encouraged settlers to sail to distant shores and remain there. Unlike the Jews returning to their homeland around the same time, these colonialists had neither a historical nor a legal claim to the land. . . .

None of that should come as any surprise to Lorde, of course: as a [self-described] “informed young citizen,” she surely understands that when an occupying force illegally and cruelly deprives an indigenous population of its right to self-determination in its historical homeland, nothing but moral catastrophe may ensue. Thankfully, the aboriginal Jews have successfully and miraculously managed to return to their native land, and there established a flowering democracy that, like all democracies, is flawed. The Maori in New Zealand weren’t so lucky. If Lorde truly wants to stand with the oppressed, she [should] never go home again.

Analyzing the recent direct Iranian attack on Israel, and Israel’s security situation more generally, Michael Oren looks to the 2015 agreement to restrain Iran’s nuclear program. That, and President Biden’s efforts to resurrect the deal after Donald Trump left it, are in his view the source of the current crisis:

Of the original motivations for the deal—blocking Iran’s path to the bomb and transforming Iran into a peaceful nation—neither remained. All Biden was left with was the ability to kick the can down the road and to uphold Barack Obama’s singular foreign-policy achievement.

In order to achieve that result, the administration has repeatedly refused to punish Iran for its malign actions:

Historians will survey this inexplicable record and wonder how the United States not only allowed Iran repeatedly to assault its citizens, soldiers, and allies but consistently rewarded it for doing so. They may well conclude that in a desperate effort to avoid getting dragged into a regional Middle Eastern war, the U.S. might well have precipitated one.

While America’s friends in the Middle East, especially Israel, have every reason to feel grateful for the vital assistance they received in intercepting Iran’s missile and drone onslaught, they might also ask what the U.S. can now do differently to deter Iran from further aggression. . . . Tehran will see this weekend’s direct attack on Israel as a victory—their own—for their ability to continue threatening Israel and destabilizing the Middle East with impunity.

Israel, of course, must respond differently. Our target cannot simply be the Iranian proxies that surround our country and that have waged war on us since October 7, but, as the Saudis call it, “the head of the snake.”