The late political scientist James Q. Wilson posed this question in a 2008 essay exploring, first, the positive attitude of many evangelical Christians not only toward Judaism and the Jewish state but toward actual Jews and, second, most Jews’ continual suspicion of any political alliance with these Christians. In a conversation with Jonathan Silver, Mitchell Rocklin revisits Wilson’s arguments and raises the possibility that Israeli Jews, American Orthodox Jews, and evangelical Christians may soon share more common ground politically with each other than with the majority of American Jewry. (Audio, 34 minutes.)

Yohanan Tzoreff, writing yesterday, believes that Hamas still wishes to return to the truce that it ended Friday morning with renewed rocket attacks on Israel, but hopes it can do so on better terms—raising the price, so to speak, of each hostage released. Examining recent statements from the terrorist group’s leaders, he tries to make sense of what it is thinking:

These [Hamas] senior officials do not reflect any awareness of the changed attitude in Israel toward Hamas following the October 7 massacre carried out by the organization in the western Negev communities. They continue to estimate that as before, Israel will be willing to pay high prices for its people and that time is working in their favor. In their opinion, Israel’s interest in the release of its people, the pressure of the hostages’ families, and the public’s broad support for these families will ultimately be decisive in favor of a deal that will meet the new conditions set by Hamas.

In other words, the culture of summud (steadfastness), still guides Hamas. Its [rhetoric] does not show at all that it has internalized or recognized the change in the attitude of the Israeli public toward it—which makes it clear that Israel still has a lot of work to do.