The Department of State’s annual report on human-rights abuses around the world, released on March 3, devotes 69 pages to Israel and an additional 72 to the West Bank and Gaza, for a combined total equaling that devoted to China. No other nation, not even Syria or Iran, received such attention. But the problem is far more than a quantitative one, as Evelyn Gordon points out:

Take, for instance, the demolition of illegal construction in the Israeli Bedouin town of Umm al-Hiran. We’ll leave aside the question of why demolishing illegal construction—with the approval of several courts, including the Supreme Court, and while offering the residents alternative land plus cash compensation—constitutes a human-rights violation at all. It’s enough to consider a single sentence, which is based on a report by an Israeli NGO, the Negev Coexistence Forum (NCF): “The NCF reported that construction work on [the planned new town of] Hiran progressed and expanded during the year, reaching to within a few yards of Bedouin houses in Umm al-Hiran, and residents suffered from the dust raised by construction.”

Is this a joke? Or do State’s human-rights gurus seriously think people suffering from the dust of nearby construction constitutes a human-rights violation? By that logic, the only place anyone could build without violating human rights would be in wilderness areas. . . . .

But far worse than such inanities is the way the report traffics in unsupported libel. Take, for instance, this gem: “There were reports some children worked in forced labor in the West Bank, including in settlements. NGOs reported employers subjected Palestinian men to forced labor in Israeli settlements. . . . The Palestinian Authority was unable to monitor and investigate abuses in these areas.”

In other words, the State Department accused Israel of subjecting Palestinians—including children—to forced labor, without citing a single example to substantiate this accusation. . . . Nor is this lack of evidence surprising, since the accusation is groundless. So why was such a vile, unsubstantiated allegation even included in the report?

A human-rights report worthy of the name would prioritize, devoting most of its attention to the world’s worst abusers. It would reflect enough basic good judgment to excise inanities like “suffering from construction dust.” It would either try to confirm unsubstantiated allegations or omit them because they were unsubstantiated. . . . Instead, the State Department apparently just copied and pasted anything it could find from [anti-Israel NGOs], no matter how ludicrous or unsubstantiated.

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.