In the past few years, U.S. courts have been overturning laws and state-government decisions that prevent public funds from supporting religious institutions engaged in educational or other activities. Tim Rosenberger and Nicole Stelle Garnett explain the latest legal victory for religious freedom:

Loffman v. California Department of Education was brought by Orthodox Jewish families who sought to admit their disabled children to private Jewish schools under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act but found themselves thwarted by California on the grounds that the schools were “sectarian.” In a sharply worded opinion, the court rejected California’s argument and instead sided with the families, affirming their constitutional right to access public benefits without sacrificing their faith commitments.

The Loffman verdict is not just a legal win for the families involved; it’s a strike at the heart of California’s pervasive and unconstitutional practice of discriminating against religious institutions and believers. California law contains an array of rules that systematically discriminate against religious institutions, barring them from participating in public programs.

Consider a few examples. The state bars homeschooling parents who work with independent-study charter schools from including any religious content in their children’s customized curriculum. It also excludes religious schools from publicly funded pre-K, teacher-diversity, work-study, and teacher affordable-housing programs. California even prohibits school districts from contracting with “sectarian” hospitals to instruct patients with special needs. While the Ninth Circuit’s Loffman decision clarifies that such policies violate the Free Exercise Clause, they nevertheless remain on the books.

Ron Ben-Yishai, reporting from a visit to IDF forces in the Gaza Strip, analyzes the state of the fighting, and “the persistent challenge of eradicating an entrenched enemy in a complex urban terrain.”

Hamas, sensing the war’s end, is mounting a final effort to inflict casualties. The IDF now controls 65 percent of Gaza’s territory operationally, with observation, fire dominance, and relative freedom of movement, alongside systematic tunnel destruction. . . . Major P, a reserve company commander, says, “It’s frustrating to hear at home that we’re stagnating. The public doesn’t get that if we stop, Hamas will recover.”

Senior IDF officers cite two reasons for the slow progress: meticulous care to protect hostages, requiring cautious movement and constant intelligence gathering, and avoiding heavy losses, with 22 soldiers killed since June.

Two-and-a-half of Hamas’s five brigades have been dismantled, yet a new hostage deal and IDF withdrawal could allow Hamas to regroup. . . . Hamas is at its lowest military and governing point since its founding, reduced to a fragmented guerrilla force. Yet, without complete disarmament and infrastructure destruction, it could resurge as a threat in years.

At the same time, Ben-Yishai observes, not everything hangs on the IDF:

According to the Southern Command chief Major General Yaron Finkelman, the IDF is close to completing its objectives. In classical military terms, “defeat” means the enemy surrenders—but with a jihadist organization, the benchmark is its ability to operate against Israel.

Despite [the IDF’s] battlefield successes, the broader strategic outcome—especially regarding the hostages—now hinges on decisions from the political leadership. “We’ve done our part,” said a senior officer. “We’ve reached a crossroads where the government must decide where it wants to go—both on the hostage issue and on Gaza’s future.”