Falling birthrates in developed countries have led to numerous proposals, some of which have been implemented, about how to reverse the trend. Catherine Ruth Pakaluk argues that most people seeking to solve the problem are going about it wrong:

South Korea suffers the world’s lowest birthrates—0.71 expected births per woman. In the city of Seoul, that number is just 0.59. The South Korean government estimates that it has spent $210 billion trying to revive its gasping birthrate. The cash hasn’t worked. It hasn’t worked anywhere it’s been tried.

Pronatalist policy proposals in the U.S. make two faulty assumptions about falling birthrates. First, that religious outliers [who have several children] have zero relevance for reviving American families. Second, that we can incentivize anything we want with tax and subsidy schemes.

Pakaluk has spent the past four years traveling around America speaking with women who have chosen to have large families. Many are deeply religious. Among them is Leah, who, along with her husband, embraced Orthodox Judaism while in college:

Leah’s story made it excruciatingly obvious why child subsidies won’t raise the birthrate. Cash incentives can’t answer what needs to be answered: a reason to give up dreams and aspirations that can’t hang on past one or two kids. We know we can incentivize moving away from oil, cigarettes, and Big Gulps. But can we incentivize moving away from careers and interests we’ve prepared women to fulfill from their earliest school days? My research suggested that such a choice comes from deep within. It must be wanted for its own sake, counted as worth the costs, which are personal and subjective.

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.