Created by the Israeli team behind the wildly successful show Fauda, the miniseries Ghosts of Beirut dramatizes the story of Imad Mughniyeh, the former second-in-command of Hizballah. Mughniyeh—who before 2001 had killed more Americans than any other terrorist—was killed in Damascus by the CIA, with the assistance of the Mossad. Hussain Abdul-Hussain argues that the series distorts crucial facts about its subject’s career, and thus about the history of jihadism.

The show opens with [Iranian] Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) officers approaching Mughniyeh, then working as a car mechanic, and plucking him out of obscurity. This is incorrect. If anything, it was Mughniyeh who helped found the IRGC.

In 1970, Jordan expelled Palestinian militias, then under the command of Yasir Arafat. They relocated to Lebanon, . . . which allowed Palestinian armed factions to roam the country freely. Arafat thus became Lebanon’s strongest militiaman and de-facto ruler, just like Hizballah’s chief Hassan Nasrallah today. In his tug and pull with the Lebanese state, Arafat instructed his second-in-command, Khalil al-Wazir, better known by his nom du guerre Abu Jihad, to form an elite unit, Force 17, designed to counter Lebanon’s Police Force 16.

Because the shah [of Iran] had been Israel’s ally, Arafat had sponsored and trained the Iranian opposition that would seize power in the revolution.

It was through his association with Force 17 that Mughniyeh came into contact with the Iranian jihadists who seized control of Persia in 1979, founded the IRGC, and now direct Hizballah:

After America went to war in Iraq in 2003, Mughniyeh planned attacks that killed American troops. While Ghosts of Beirut covered these attacks well, it incorrectly implied that some of them were ordered by Mughniyeh without IRGC knowledge. . . . To depict Mughniyeh as anything other than a pawn of Tehran goes against everything that is known about [him].

For some time, opponents of U.S support for Israel have been urging the White House to end the war in Gaza, or simply calling for a ceasefire. Douglas Feith and Lewis Libby consider what such a result would actually entail:

Ending the war immediately would allow Hamas to survive and retain military and governing power. Leaving it in the area containing the Sinai-Gaza smuggling routes would ensure that Hamas can rearm. This is why Hamas leaders now plead for a ceasefire. A ceasefire will provide some relief for Gazans today, but a prolonged ceasefire will preserve Hamas’s bloody oppression of Gaza and make future wars with Israel inevitable.

For most Gazans, even when there is no hot war, Hamas’s dictatorship is a nightmarish tyranny. Hamas rule features the torture and murder of regime opponents, official corruption, extremist indoctrination of children, and misery for the population in general. Hamas diverts foreign aid and other resources from proper uses; instead of improving life for the mass of the people, it uses the funds to fight against Palestinians and Israelis.

Moreover, a Hamas-affiliated website warned Gazans last month against cooperating with Israel in securing and delivering the truckloads of aid flowing into the Strip. It promised to deal with those who do with “an iron fist.” In other words, if Hamas remains in power, it will begin torturing, imprisoning, or murdering those it deems collaborators the moment the war ends. Thereafter, Hamas will begin planning its next attack on Israel:

Hamas’s goals are to overshadow the Palestinian Authority, win control of the West Bank, and establish Hamas leadership over the Palestinian revolution. Hamas’s ultimate aim is to spark a regional war to obliterate Israel and, as Hamas leaders steadfastly maintain, fulfill a Quranic vision of killing all Jews.

Hamas planned for corpses of Palestinian babies and mothers to serve as the mainspring of its October 7 war plan. Hamas calculated it could survive a war against a superior Israeli force and energize enemies of Israel around the world. The key to both aims was arranging for grievous Palestinian civilian losses. . . . That element of Hamas’s war plan is working impressively.