In April, Alcee Hastings, a Democratic congressman representing a largely African American district in the Ford Lauderdale and West Palm Beach area, died after a long career in office. As a result of the unexpected vacancy, a multicandidate primary took place on Tuesday. Just a month before the election, one of the contenders, State Representative Omari Hardy, publicly declared himself a supporter of the movement to boycott, sanction, and divest from Israel (BDS). Hardy came in sixth, with 6 percent of the vote, but David Schraub sees an important lesson here about the Democrats and BDS:

Omari Hardy was competing in a sprawling, wide-open field for an open congressional seat. If you’re going to stand out from the pack, you need to do something that clearly marks you as different from the pack. Adopting a generic pro-Israel position in the same vein as all the other candidates wouldn’t give anyone a reason to vote for him. . . . Announcing support for BDS and pivoting toward intense pronounced hostility to Israel was a calculated risk; it at least offered him a chance to win, even if the more likely result was that he’d just lose by a wider margin. (Before he announced his pro-BDS turn, Hardy was polling at 10 percent, so if anything he slipped in performance).

Omari Hardy represents the future of BDS not just because he shows that BDS remains whatever the opposite of a selling point is for most Democrats. That is certainly an important lesson to learn. But just as importantly, he’s the future because he perceived—and I think not incorrectly—that endorsing BDS is a way of standing out from other Democrats and potentially consolidating the backing of a small but intense wing of the progressive movement, some of whom border on being single-issue anti-Israel voters.

[M]ore and more frequently, we’ll see cases like Omari Hardy: candidates who are laboring at the back of a crowded field and are looking to stand out and get a burst of cash and volunteers, or safe-seat backbenchers yearning to garner a national profile and Internet likes, will view BDS as a promising avenue for rising for obscurity. It won’t win them national or competitive races; it often won’t even succeed in fragmented contests among Democrats. But if you’re going to lose the race anyway, it’s a cost-free gamble.

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.