The low rate of ultra-Orthodox participation in Israel’s workforce is a major problem both for the Israeli economy and for haredi communities. But a growing number have founded high-tech start-ups, and one of them has launched a forum to encourage greater entrepreneurship. David Shamah writes:

For many Israelis, the terms “ultra-Orthodox” and “high-tech entrepreneur” don’t belong in the same sentence. Tech entrepreneurs are open to new ideas, experiment with advanced technologies, show independent spirit, and are at home on the Internet—quite the opposite of the popular stereotype of the average haredi individual.

But anyone who thinks that way is behind the times, says Itzik Crombie.

“Haredim are just as creative and imaginative, and as willing to succeed, as are secular Israelis—in fact, from what I have seen among those in the high-tech world, they are even more ambitious. . . . The problem is that they don’t have role models to show them how to navigate the business world and get to the point where they can build their own businesses.”

Addressing a recent meeting of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s Central Committee, Mahmoud Abbas criticized Hamas more sharply than he has previously (at least in public), calling them “sons of dogs.” The eighty-nine-year-old Palestinian Authority president urged the terrorist group to “stop the war of extermination in Gaza” and “hand over the American hostages.” The editors of the New York Sun comment:

Mr. Abbas has long been at odds with Hamas, which violently ousted his Fatah party from Gaza in 2007. The tone of today’s outburst, though, is new. Comparing rivals to canines, which Arabs consider dirty, is startling. Its motivation, though, was unrelated to the plight of the 59 remaining hostages, including 23 living ones. Instead, it was an attempt to use an opportune moment for reviving Abbas’s receding clout.

[W]hile Hamas’s popularity among Palestinians soared after its orgy of killing on October 7, 2023, it is now sinking. The terrorists are hoarding Gaza aid caches that Israel declines to replenish. As the war drags on, anti-Hamas protests rage across the Strip. Polls show that Hamas’s previously elevated support among West Bank Arabs is also down. Striking the iron while it’s hot, Abbas apparently longs to retake center stage. Can he?

Diminishing support for Hamas is yet to match the contempt Arabs feel toward Abbas himself. Hamas considers him irrelevant for what it calls “the resistance.”

[Meanwhile], Abbas is yet to condemn Hamas’s October 7 massacre. His recent announcement of ending alms for terror is a ruse.

Abbas, it’s worth noting, hasn’t saved all his epithets for Hamas. He also twice said of the Americans, “may their fathers be cursed.” Of course, after a long career of anti-Semitic incitement, Abbas can’t be expected to have a moral awakening. Nor is there much incentive for him to fake one. But, like the protests in Gaza, Abbas’s recent diatribe is a sign that Hamas is perceived as weak and that its stock is sinking.