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Diplomatic consequences

It’s a phrase used often by critical American Jews unhappy with the direction Israel has taken and yearning for the sandal-wearing, orange-growing, labor-union-dominated country of old: “This is not your grandmother’s Israel.”

No, it is not – and not only because the country has moved decidedly to the Right over the last 40 years.

Israel has changed in other ways as well.

It is no longer a poor country with a small population and little to offer the world beyond the Uzi and Jaffa oranges. It is a regional military and technological power with a population that would rank 13th in the European Union and a GDP per capita that would rank ninth.

Why does this matter? Because Israel today has options that the Israel of your grandmother’s era did not. When another country takes steps inimical to its interests, it need not simply protest, absorb the blow, and move on. It can impose a cost.

Restricting access in response to boycotts, bans

Take the Netherlands.

Beginning on September 22, the Dutch government will ban imports coming from beyond the Green Line. On Tuesday, Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar responded by expelling Dutch representatives from the US-led Gaza coordination center in Kiryat Gat, which oversees ceasefire monitoring, humanitarian activity, and planning for Gaza’s postwar administration.

“Our message is clear,” Sa’ar wrote. “Those who act against Israel will have no foothold in the region. Israel will not allow measures to be taken against it without a response.”

That is the correct message.

The Dutch, like several other European governments, want it both ways. They want to take punitive, one-sided measures against Israel while retaining a seat at the table when consequential regional diplomacy is conducted. They want to sanction Israel in one arena while enjoying influence in another.

But diplomacy does not – or at least should not – work that way.

Access is an asset. Influence is an asset. Participation in shaping Gaza’s future is an asset. Israel is entitled to use those assets as leverage against governments that believe they can penalize it with impunity.

This is not diplomatic petulance. It is statecraft. Countries routinely link behavior in one sphere to consequences in another. In the past, Israel has generally been reluctant to do so. That attitude is changing.

In April, Israel barred Spain from the same Kiryat Gat center after Spain took hostile measures. The action against the Netherlands, therefore, looks less like a one-off response than an emerging policy: governments that wage diplomatic campaigns against Israel should not expect Israeli help in enhancing their regional relevance.

But there are limits. The Kiryat Gat mechanism is American-led and depends on broad international participation. Israel should coordinate these moves with Washington and ensure that retaliation does not damage Jerusalem’s interests.

Retaliation should be measured and purposeful. But those are arguments for using leverage wisely, not for surrendering it altogether.

Israel has the strength, ability to respond to action taken against it

The next test may be Britain. Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband recently called Israel’s publication of tenders for construction in E1 “an unacceptable and destructive act,” demanded that Israel halt the project, and warned that the UK would not “stand back and accept the destruction of the two-state solution.”

Sa’ar rejected both the substance of Miliband’s statement and “the patronizing tone of his words.” That description was spot on. Britain is entitled to oppose Israeli policy. It isn’t entitled to lecture Israel as though addressing a misbehaving colonial ward whose role is to listen and obey.

Sa’ar also correctly called Miliband’s statement entirely one-sided. He then laid down the principle that should guide Israel’s response: “The UK government’s decision to damage the relationship between our countries is deeply unfortunate. But Israel will not be a passive victim of this policy. Israel will defend its rights, its interests, and its people.”

Israel need not answer every criticism, nor should every response be maximal. But when criticism hardens into policy intended to damage the relationship, Jerusalem should determine which elements of that relationship Britain can no longer take for granted.

That may mean a diplomatic downgrade, exclusion from a particular forum, or a reassessment of specific forms of cooperation. The response should fit the offense and protect Israel’s interests – not merely vent anger.

But this is not your grandmother’s Israel. It is stronger, richer, larger, and less dependent on the goodwill of governments that demand much from it while asking little of its enemies. Its diplomacy should reflect that reality.

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What began, according to an indictment, as an “initiation ceremony” for a young female police officer at a Border Police base allegedly turned into a violent and humiliating incident.

Israel’s Department of Internal Police Investigations (DIPI) filed an indictment on Wednesday with the Petah Tikva Magistrate’s Court against Itamar Karko, a Border Police squad commander in the Judea and Samaria Division, accusing him of assault and an indecent act against a female police officer who served with him.

The indictment, filed by attorney Lidor Malko, details events that allegedly took place at the Abu Dis base. Karko enlisted in the Border Police in November 2023. The complainant, whose name is barred from publication and is referred to in the indictment as A., enlisted in the Border Police in August 2024. The two later served together at the base.

According to the indictment, on the night of February 19, 2025, after the two had completed a joint shift, they went to a building at the base used as a club. The purpose of going there, according to the indictment, was to conduct a “humiliating and violent initiation ceremony” carried out by veteran police officers for younger officers as part of what was known in the unit as a “zuvor” game, a hazing ritual.

Upon entering the club, Karko allegedly locked the door and blocked the handle with a broomstick.

Karko allegedly struck, sexually harassed the complainant

According to the indictment, Karko initially ordered the female officer to turn her back toward him and place her hands on one of the refrigerators in the room. She complied as part of the same “zuvor” game, after which Karko began asking her questions. Each time she answered incorrectly, he allegedly punched her forcefully in the ribs. The DIPI claims this occurred on approximately 15 occasions.

The indictment states that Karko later ordered her to turn around and remove the coat she was wearing. The questioning continued, and whenever she gave an incorrect answer, he allegedly punched her in the stomach. The DIPI attributes five additional blows to him in this manner.

Karko then allegedly began pulling the officer’s hair whenever she answered incorrectly. At one point, he asked whether she was tired, and after she replied that she was not, he continued pulling her hair, according to the indictment.

The indictment states that the incident later took on a sexual nature. Karko allegedly held the officer’s face with both hands and sat on a chair with his legs spread apart. He ordered her to approach him and then pulled her hair forcefully until she fell to her knees between his legs.

While holding her face, Karko allegedly pulled her toward him and brought her face close to his genitals without her consent. According to the indictment, the officer managed to break free from his grip in panic and stood up. The two then left the club.

The DIPI alleges that Karko unlawfully assaulted the officer and committed an act intended for sexual stimulation, gratification, or humiliation without her consent. The indictment charges him with assault and an indecent act.

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A new Finance Ministry report has revealed major salary disparities across Israel’s security organizations, with employees in some Defense Ministry auxiliary units earning more than twice the average salary of younger career soldiers.

The report also found that the average state pension of an IDF officer is valued at approximately NIS 9 million.

The figures were published in the Finance Ministry’s Salary and Labor Agreements Division report on defense system employees for 2023-2024. The report examines the impact of the war, salary agreements, and changes in the workforce composition of Israel’s security organizations.

The highest average salary was recorded among Defense Ministry auxiliary units, including the Atomic Energy Commission, where employees earned an average of NIS 34,315 gross per month in 2024.

Employees at Israel’s intelligence agencies, Mossad and Shin Bet (Israeli Security Agency), earned an average of NIS 32,225, while the average salary at the Israel Institute for Biological Research stood at NIS 31,932.

IDF’s average salary lowest among branches examined in report

The average salary for civilian employees of the IDF totaled NIS 22,926, while Israel Police employees earned an average of NIS 20,562 and Prison Service employees earned NIS 18,889.

The Finance Ministry noted, however, that significant salary increases granted to police and Prison Service employees from mid 2024 are expected to be fully reflected only in the 2025 report.

Alongside rising salaries, the number of employees across Israel’s security organizations also increased. In 2024, the police employed approximately 26,900 workers, the Prison Service employed about 9,500, and the IDF’s civilian workforce included around 8,500 employees.

Together, the three organizations with publicly available figures employed approximately 44,900 workers, an increase of about 2,500 employees within one year. The number of IDF personnel and employees in the intelligence agencies and Defense Ministry auxiliary units was not disclosed.

The IDF’s overall average salary was the lowest among the organizations examined, standing at NIS 18,756. At the same time, salaries for younger career soldiers continued to rise. The average salary for soldiers in their initial career service period reached NIS 13,845 per month, compared with NIS 11,786 in 2022, an increase of approximately 17.5%.

At the top end of the salary scale, the average monthly salary of an IDF major general reached NIS 73,099. A police commissioner earned an average of NIS 66,084, while the average salary of a Prison Service commissioner stood at NIS 62,946.

The war also contributed to an expansion of the IDF’s civilian workforce. The number of civilian employees increased from approximately 6,600 in 2021 to about 8,000 in 2024, primarily due to recruitment in intelligence, cyber, and technology fields. As a result, the average age of civilian IDF employees declined from 50 to 44.

Average pension higher than 2024 target, report finds

One of the report’s key findings concerns the state pension system for IDF officers. The average cumulative value of an officer’s pension stands at approximately NIS 9 million, with the average retirement age at 45 and the average monthly pension payment reaching NIS 20,019.

The average pension is approximately NIS 4,300 higher than the target set for 2024, which stood at NIS 15,717. The target for 2025 is NIS 15,553, but the report warned that the figures raise concerns that the IDF will not be able to meet that goal.

Under Israeli law, if the average pension of retiring officers remains above the target, the finance minister will be required to establish new regulations governing pension payments.

Women currently make up about one-third of career soldiers in the IDF and 41.2% of employees at the Israel Institute for Biological Research.

However, gender salary gaps widened slightly in 2024, partly due to activity and combat-related bonuses that were primarily awarded to field positions, where the proportion of men is higher.

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Dolly Parton, the singer who died Tuesday at age 80 after a brief bout with cancer, was mourned around the world as a stellar songwriter, consummate country hitmaker, savvy entrepreneur and generous philanthropist. 

In Jewish circles, she was also remembered as the inspiration for PJ Library, a program that sends free children’s books to Jewish families in order to foster Jewish values and traditions.

In 2015, when Harold Grinspoon launched PJ Library, he took a page from Parton, who a decade earlier had started Imagination Library, a literacy program that mails free children’s books to families across the US.

After hearing Parton interviewed about the program, Grinspoon, a philanthropist in and out of the Jewish community, signed on as a sponsor of the Imagination Library in Western Massachusetts, where he lives.

“We should create a Jewish version of Imagination Library,” said Grinspoon, according to a 2023 recollection by his daughter-in-law and president of the Harold Grinspoon Foundation, Winnie Sandler Grinspoon. 

“Harold was looking for ways to build Jewish literacy,” she wrote. “He was witnessing a lack of connection to the values, stories, and traditions that have been at the center of the Jewish experience for millennia.” 

Growing up in an impoverished family, Parton’s rose to fame on her own accord

Two decades later, PJ Library has more than 670,000 subscribers in 40 countries.

On Tuesday, in a tribute to Parton, PJ Library and the Harold Grinspoon Foundation recalled a meeting between the two in 2023. According to an Instagram post, “she shared the following with him: ‘I am honored to get to help inspire a love of reading in children. They truly are our future.’”

“Harold remembers Dolly as ‘a truly amazing person — not only a great artist, but a great entrepreneur and philanthropist,” according to the post. “We honor Dolly for educating millions, for her remarkable career, her kindness, her art, and especially her generosity.”

“Dolly’s generosity of spirit extended far beyond inspiring the creation of PJ Library,” Alex Zablotsky, PJ Library’s executive director, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

Parton drew inspiration for her art and philanthropy from her hardscrabble roots in rural Tennessee. She was one of 12 kids growing up in a one-room log cabin in the Smoky Mountains. Parton’s father never learned how to read or write.

“This actually started because my father could not read and write, and I saw how crippling that could be,” Parton said of the Imagination Library at a ceremony where she was awarded a Carnegie Medal for her partnership with a pediatric hospital in East Tennessee, now named for Parton.

“My dad was a very smart man. And I often wondered what he could have done had he been able to read and write. So that is the inspiration,” she said.

Parton had a close bond with other Jews, notably Sandy Gallin, the manager who guided her from Nashville to mainstream pop stardom, according to the Forward.

When Gallin died in 2017, Parton said, “Nobody could quite get how the Christian Southern girl and the New York Jewish boy could have so much in common. But it was real.”

Parton ‘recognized’ the mistake in her comments about Jewish people in Hollywood

One trouble spot, however, came in a 1994 interview with Vogue Magazine, when Parton mused about starting a television series about a country singer who turns to gospel music. She gave up the idea, she said, because “most of the people out here [Hollywood] are Jewish and it’s frightening for them to promote Christianity.”

She later apologized in a letter to Abe Foxman, then head of the Anti-Defamation League, JTA reported at the time.

“I know how stereotypes can be hurtful,” she wrote. “Like all Americans of good will, I recognize the importance of rejecting prejudice.”

Foxman accepted her apology. “Whatever she said was unfortunate, and she recognizes that,’” Foxman told The New York Times. “I know it’s not easy for celebrities to publicly say they made a mistake. As far as we are concerned, the matter is behind us.”

On Tuesday, Laura Liebman, director of development for The Bronfman Fellowship for young Jewish leaders, paid tribute to the singer, who was a feminist and an ally of the LGBTQ+ community.

“Dolly somehow managed to transcend race, class, religion, politics and gender,” Liebman wrote in an essay for eJewishPhilanthropy. “As the Jewish community becomes increasingly siloed, we could all learn from Dolly’s radical acceptance and show more love and compassion for our fellow Jews.” 

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A six-month-old baby was admitted earlier this week to the public Assuta Ashdod Medical Center, and received surgery after having swallowed a packet of staples, Walla learnt Wednesday.

The parents sought medical treatment for the baby several times, after about a month and a half of persistent coughing, wheezing, and shortness of breath. During this time, the baby was treated with inhalations and medication, but his condition did not significantly improve. Later, the baby also developed vomiting.

Upon arrival at the hospital’s emergency department, an X-ray was performed, revealing an unusual foreign object in the baby’s esophagus: a packet of staples. Some of the staples remained connected to one another, while others had separated and become lodged in the wall of the esophagus.

Due to the location of the staples and the baby’s respiratory condition, doctors decided to urgently transfer him to the operating room. The procedure involved teams from pediatric gastroenterology, ear, nose, and throat, and pulmonology, along with the anesthesia team, partly due to concern that some of the staples had also reached the airways.

During a complex procedure that lasted about an hour and a half, the staples were removed one by one, including those that had already pierced the esophageal wall.

The prolonged presence of the staples inside the baby’s body caused local damage, swelling, inflammation, and infection in the area. After they were removed, he was treated with antibiotics, medication to reduce acidity, steroids, and inhalations. Initially, he was fed through a tube to allow the esophagus to recover and heal.

Babies swallowing foreign objects can lead to persistent symptoms

“The baby arrived at our hospital after a long period of coughing, shortness of breath, and wheezing that did not go away despite the treatments he received,” Dr. Chani Oliveston, director of the Pediatric Gastroenterology Unit at Assuta Ashdod Hospital, said.

“In the case of a baby, who cannot explain what happened or whether he swallowed something, it is important to remember that a foreign object can also cause persistent symptoms. In this case, the staples had already caused inflammation, infection, and swelling in the esophagus, and the baby’s respiratory condition was not good. Fortunately, we were able to remove all the staples. The message to parents is simple: when symptoms continue and do not improve as expected, it is important to continue investigating the cause.”

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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the family of Sgt. First Class Yehuda Yekutiel Katz on Wednesday to offer his condolences following his burial last week, the Prime Minister’s Office announced.

Netanyahu told the family that he was “deeply moved” by the return of Katz’s remains to Israel, and expressed his sorrow over the fact that Katz’s parents passed away before the return.

The family told Netanyahu about Katz’s character, describing him as a “a Torah scholar, a man of values, and a professional and devoted fighter,” the PMO said.

Last week, the IDF recovered the remains of Katz in an operation in Lebanon, 44 years after he went missing during the First Lebanon War, in the Battle of Sultan Yacoub on June 11, 1982.

Two other soldiers were also declared missing in the same instance, their bodies recovered in 2019 and 2025. 

All of Israel embraces Katz family, Netanyahu says upon body’s return

“In an operation led by the Military Intelligence and a joint community effort with the Mossad, the remains of Yehuda were located and brought to Israel,” the IDF said last week.

“After they were brought to Israel, an identification process was conducted at the Military Rabbinate’s Center for the Identification of Fallen, in cooperation with the Medical Corps and the Israel Police.”

“Today, all of us, the entire people of Israel, embrace the Katz family,” said Netanyahu upon the return of his body.

“His dear parents, Sarah and Yosef, of blessed memory, never stopped working to locate him and bring him home, and sadly, they have already passed away. To you, his siblings Avi and Perachia, we return your beloved Yehuda, to you and to the soil of the Land of Israel that he loved so much.”

Former deputy defense minister Major (res.) Rabbi Eli Ben-Dahan, who fought alongside Katz in the Battle of Sultan Yacoub, said he felt “chills” upon hearing the announcement of the discovery.

“The circle of the great effort to save the armored battalion that was caught in a Syrian ambush has closed. No one is left behind,” Ben-Dahan said.

“The eternal people are not afraid of a long road.”

Katz was buried on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem on Friday, in a ceremony attended by Mossad chief Roman Gofman among others.

Miriam Sela-Eitam and Yonah Jeremy Bob contributed to this report.

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Twelve people were killed in wildfires that swept through several Algerian provinces, Interior Minister Said Sayoud said late on Wednesday, according to Algerian radio.

The fatalities included five people in Jijel province, four in Bejaia and three in Tizi Ouzou, the local Ennahar TV said.

Sayoud added that 54 people had suffered burn injuries, including six in critical condition who are currently in intensive care.

Algeria’s civil protection services recorded 154 wildfires across the country on Wednesday. Thirty-six fires were reported in Bejaia province alone, of which 18 had been brought under control.

The fires come as an exceptional heatwave sweeps across North Africa, particularly Tunisia and Algeria.

This is a developing story.

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“It’s the biggest closure and a huge moment of victory,” former Gaza hostage Evyatar David said about Eliya Cohen, another former hostage, recently getting married, during an interview with CNN on Wednesday.

The interview marked the first time the 25-year-old had spoken to international media about his experiences as a Hamas hostage following his abduction.

“They tried to ruin our [lives] and our families’ lives and eventually they didn’t manage to ruin everything,” he said.

Nevertheless, the former hostage explained that he was still suffering from intense psychological trauma from his experiences. 

“It can surprise me any time, one hour I can be fine and happy, and next I can remember something from captivity, and get flashbacks,” he told CNN. “I wake up at night with nightmares, and it affects me all day after that. It’s very unstable and random.”

The Israeli government, David claimed, was not providing enough support for himself and the other former hostages. “I hope the next government will do better, I don’t know who it’s going to be, but I trust they will do better.” 

David was abducted from the Nova music festival on October 7, 2023, together with his childhood best friend, Guy Gilboa-Dalal. He was held hostage by Hamas until October 13, 2025.

Hamas starved hostage before propaganda video of digging his own grave

During that time, Hamas released propaganda videos of David, one of which showed him and Gilboa-Dalal forced to witness a staged release ceremony for other captives in February 2025, only to be left behind. The second, released in August 2025, showed David gaunt and pale, emaciated and digging his own grave, shocking the nation.

During his CNN interview, David discussed how weak he had been during the filming of the latter video, due to the starvation inflicted upon him by his captors.

“It’s all staged, but it relies on the truth – we didn’t eat for three months,” he explained. “You can see my body, I could barely move, when I tried to dig the grave, just to hold the shovel was almost impossible, probably the hardest physical thing I ever did.”

His guards, on the other hand, had food, air conditioning, and television, David told CNN.

“They told us there is no food in Gaza, but we knew it’s not true ‘cos we always saw the terrorists – they were fat and had muscles. We knew they were lying and starving us,” he said.

“I could hear them laughing, eating cakes and drinking tea, like there is nobody walking next to them that looks like a skeleton.”

Former hostage does not think peace is possible

David expressed pessimism about the possibility of US President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace succeeding in its mission to secure a lasting peace between Israel and Gaza.

“I don’t think it’s possible,” he said, “because their pure ideology, they just want the whole land. They don’t really care about Gaza. I could see in their eyes – It’s the thing that they want the most.”

Danya Saperstein contributed to this report.

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US President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Wednesday declaring a national emergency and banning the use of some foreign equipment in the US electricity grid, the White House said.

The order cites what the White House described as an “unusual and extraordinary foreign threat” posed by foreign-made bulk-power systems that may present national security vulnerabilities.

Trump’s order, the latest example of ⁠Washington’s approach to tackling technology threats posed by China, follows a decision by the European Commission earlier this year to ban Chinese-made inverters from publicly funded energy projects.

Last year, Reuters reported that rogue communication devices not listed in product documents had been found in some Chinese solar power inverters ​by US experts who strip down equipment hooked up to grids to check for security issues.

US considers technology ‘extraordinary threat,’ executive order says

“I … find that the situation with respect to the foreign supply of bulk-power system electric equipment constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat, which has its source in whole or substantial part outside the United States, to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States and hereby declare a national emergency with respect to that threat,” Trump said in the order.

Under the order, certain foreign-produced bulk-power system electric equipment, including associated critical software and digital capabilities that could pose cybersecurity or operational risks, will be barred from being purchased or installed in the United States, the White House said in a statement.

The order also asks the US Energy Secretary to impose conditions on the continued use and operation of such equipment to address concerns identified by the Trump administration, the White House added.

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The United Nations has several special rapporteurs who are “totally out of control” in regard to their perspective on Israel, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres admitted in an interview with the Financial Times on Tuesday.

“Now that UN Secretary-General Guterres is leaving office, admitting that many of the UN’s human rights rapporteurs have gone ‘totally out of control,’ it’s time to ask who let them go out of control in the first place,” Israel’s UN Ambassador, Danny Danon, told The Jerusalem Post in response to the interview. “It happened on his watch!”

However, Guterres also strongly denied the UN as a whole having an institutional bias against Israel.

“I totally refuse the idea of bias,” he said. “On the contrary, I think we have been on the right side of history.”

He added that, from his perspective, the UN had been “defending what is necessary for peace to come to the Middle East.

“There are two peoples, with a few million each one,” he explained, “And there is no way one can destroy the other. So it’s probably better to do everything possible to reconcile.”

Board of Peace is not threat to UN, Guterres says

Guterres also discussed US President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace, and its attempts to achieve stability in Gaza.

The UN Secretary-General explained that he was not concerned that the Board of Peace would supplant or replace the UN.

“The truth is, if you look at what happens in Gaza, with the measures that were taken and you look at the progress that was made, let’s be honest, it is not for the UN to be worried,” he said. “It is for others to be worried about what they are doing.”

He also criticized the tendency by the US to veto UN bills concerning Israel, as well as Russia for vetoing bills related to the Russia-Ukraine war, saying that it was time for “superpowers to understand the limits of their power.”

Guterres expressed his worry that “a sense of impunity is now prevailing” among superpowers in the UN, and that the Security Council’s leverage was diminished by its lack of ability to tell countries that “they must behave [or] they’ll be punished.”

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In the weeks since progressive Israel critic Abdul El-Sayed won the Democratic primary in Michigan’s US Senate race, many Jewish and pro-Israel constituencies in the state and beyond are lining up – sometimes reluctantly – for his Republican opponent.

But recent reports have cast doubt on how much support the GOP candidate, former US Rep. Mike Rogers, is comfortable receiving from pro-Israel donors. 

According to multiple outlets, Rogers and his representatives have signalled to AIPAC that they would like the pro-Israel lobbying giant to refrain from directly spending in his favor in the general election in order to avoid opening up a line of attack against the candidate, with whom El-Sayed is currently polling in a statistical tie. The campaign is instead suggesting alternative avenues of support, including funnelling cash into a general pro-Rogers super PAC.

Rogers did not respond to a Jewish Telegraphic Agency request for comment. And there is no sign the Rogers campaign has cut off relationships with AIPAC, its aligned super PACs or their donor class. Far from it: Rogers recently attended several major AIPAC-connected fundraisers in Los Angeles, according to the Times.

In addition, the vast majority of AIPAC-aligned Jewish donors to his campaign remain in his corner, according to Dennis Bernard, a Jewish resident of metro Detroit resident and political fundraiser who has said he will support Rogers. 

Nevertheless, Rogers’ reported request – which intermediaries would have to make in a way that circumvents campaign finance laws forbidding direct coordination with super PACs – underscores a growing fear among Jewish and pro-Israel groups.

AIPAC: a political liability?

In a political climate that has seen both parties turn away from Israel and AIPAC to varying degrees, more and more pro-Israel Jews say their most visible player in the political arena may have become more of a liability than an asset.

Bernard, who serves as national chair of government relations for the nonpartisan umbrella group Jewish Federations of North America, described Rogers’ maneuvering around AIPAC as “a tactical strategy.”

“I’m sure Mike is very grateful for AIPAC’s assistance and is not trying to turn down AIPAC money,” Bernard, who has connected several AIPAC-aligned Jewish donors to the Rogers campaign in his personal capacity, told JTA. “Mike’s trying to figure out with everybody else right now: In this changing world, how do you strategically take Jewish money?”

Bernard acknowledged that being linked to AIPAC has become a political liability in many races, regarded by its critics as similar to taking “data center money.” 

Reached for comment, an AIPAC spokesperson directed JTA to remarks the organization gave to the New York Times on Monday. 

“The Rogers campaign has been explicit with us that they welcome support from AIPAC and our members,” spokesperson Deryn Sousa told the NYT. 

AIPAC views El-Sayed as ‘prime target’

AIPAC rarely involves itself in general elections, but the group has stated it continues to see El-Sayed as a prime target.

David Victor, a Michigan resident and former AIPAC president who remains involved in the group, referred a reporter asking about the race to the national group.

There’s no guarantee that a less visible role for AIPAC would protect Rogers, a vocal Israel supporter, from accusations that he is in league with the group. In addition, from the lobby’s perspective, allowing others to spend money raised by AIPAC would deprive the group of both messaging control as well as the opportunity to take credit for what it hopes will be an El-Sayed defeat. 

El-Sayed, a former county health official, made AIPAC’s heavy spending in favor of his inter-party rival Rep. Haley Stevens a major talking point on the campaign trail. Many other progressive candidates this election cycle have prevailed while turning AIPAC into a target. 

AIPAC and its defenders have argued that its spending for Stevens – which exceeded $30 million – helped narrow El-Sayed’s margin of victory and weakened him in the general election. But the group has taken heavy criticism this electoral cycle, including from ideological allies, over its aggressive spending against some liberal pro-Israel candidates, which observers believe helped propel figures more hostile to Israel into office. 

Even amid his reported desire to lower the visibility of AIPAC spending in the race, Rogers has been showing signs of hoping to peel Jewish voters away from El-Sayed.

For one, he has taken on some liberal Jewish campaign surrogates. Rabbi Asher Lopatin, who leads the Modern Orthodox congregation Kehillat Etz Chayim in the Detroit suburb of Huntington Woods, spoke at a “Democrats for Mike” press conference last week while standing next to Rogers. 

Rabbi says El-Sayed shows ‘contempt’ for Jewish community

Currently on leave from his role as director of Community Relations at the Jewish Federation of Greater Ann Arbor, Lopatin told the crowd that he, a regular Democratic voter, was backing Rogers because El-Sayed “has shown contempt for the Jewish community and, frankly, for American values.” 

The rabbi cited El-Sayed’s comments after a man rammed an explosive-laden pickup truck into Temple Israel in West Bloomfield earlier this year. On that occasion, El-Sayed, speaking of the attacker who had lost family in an Israeli strike in Lebanon, said, “Hurt people do hurt people.” 

Lopatin also cited the candidate’s relationship with far-left anti-Israel streamer Hasan Piker, with whom El-Sayed had campaigned during the primary. Days after their press conference, El-Sayed distanced himself from Piker following new comments from the streamer that prompted blowback from the Jewish community. 

El-Sayed did not respond to a JTA request for comment.

Lopatin told JTA he spoke at the Rogers event “as an individual,” and said that other Jews in the community had thanked him for “speaking up for us.”

Lopatin said Roger’s reported unease about AIPAC would not affect his support for the candidate.

“Good for him. There’s plenty of Republican money,” the rabbi, who has no affiliation with AIPAC himself, said. “If I were recommending something I would say, ‘AIPAC, stay out of this race. You’ve done what you could do. Stay out. Let him run.’”

Rogers presents himself as fighter of antisemitism

Rogers is also positioning himself as a fighter of antisemitism, and his rival as a driver of it. Addressing the Michigan GOP nominating convention on Saturday, Rogers said he would support Jewish constituents whom he said would be harmed by El-Sayed.

Calling Piker the candidate’s “running mate,” Rogers said the duo’s rhetoric “has real implications” for people like a “young Jewish girl who attends the University of Michigan.” Rogers said the unnamed student told him she “hides her Star of David necklace so that violent antisemites on campus don’t see it and harass her – or worse.”

For his part, Bernard, who also runs a financial advisory firm, said it sometimes makes good business sense “not to take credit for a victory.”

“We let the client or someone else take it, and we just take our big profit and move on,” he said. “Because the people who need to know, know.”

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American singer Miley Cyrus said on Wednesday she was heartbroken following the death of her godmother, country music icon Dolly Parton, who died of cancer at age 80  on Tuesday.

“The feeling of losing my Aunt Dolly is beyond what feels right to share. Our most sacred moments were private and they’ll stay there behind the stage, beneath the glamour & between our hearts,” Cyrus, who often referred to Parton as an aunt, wrote on X/Twitter.

“What I KNOW is Dolly would want me to feel it, write a song about it, and then continue on and be strong. I have an angel by my side. I always have. One of our last conversations was about music and metamorphosis,” added the “Flowers” singer.

The feeling of losing my Aunt Dolly is beyond what feels right to share. Our most sacred moments were private and they’ll stay there behind the stage, beneath the glamour & between our hearts.

What I KNOW is Dolly would want me to feel it, write a song about it, and then… pic.twitter.com/VFV6MohLto

— Miley Cyrus (@MileyCyrus) August 26, 2026

Cyrus also said she loved Parton and described her death as a collective loss shared by family members and friends of the late singer-songwriter whose hits included “I Will Always Love You,” “Jolene,” and “9 to 5.”

Parton had been a fixture in Cyrus’ life since before her birth. The country star became Cyrus’ godmother in 1992 after Billy Ray Cyrus, Miley’s father, asked her to take on the role. The two had toured together during the success of Billy Ray Cyrus’ breakthrough hit “Achy Breaky Heart.”

Though Parton never had children of her own, she became a maternal figure to Cyrus.

“Dolly’s been like a mother to me. Actually, I was just reading this fax that she sent me two Mother’s Days ago,” Cyrus told W Magazine in 2024.

Parton guided Cyrus from Disney Channel to Hollywood Walk of Fame

Their close relationship also extended to the screen. Parton guest-starred as Miley Stewart’s Aunt Dolly in three episodes of the Disney Channel’s Hannah Montana between 2006 and 2010.

Beyond family ties, Parton served as a mentor to Cyrus throughout her music career, helping guide her transition from Disney Channel star to Grammy-winning performer and Hollywood Walk of Fame honoree.

The pair collaborated numerous times over the years. In 2019, they performed a duet of Parton’s “Jolene” during a Grammy Awards tribute to the country music legend.

They reunited in 2022 for NBC’s live special “Miley’s New Year’s Eve Party,” performing Parton’s “I Will Always Love You” and Cyrus’ “Wrecking Ball.”

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AI agents spun up by OpenAI broke into its own networks during tests gone wrong, the company said in a report published Wednesday.

The 37-page report reveals previously undisclosed aspects of the recent hacking spree powered by OpenAI’s most advanced models.

Some of the rogue behavior, which culminated in the highly publicized breach of the open source repository Hugging Face last month, has been disclosed or alluded to previously.

But many details are being revealed by the company for the first time. Some of them raised concern from at least one AI safety researcher, who said they pointed to potentially deeper problems with the technology at OpenAI and maybe beyond.

Investigation launched after OpenAI models allegedly hacked technology company

Alabama’s attorney general said on Monday the state had opened an investigation into OpenAI after its models hacked technology company Hugging Face last month, raising concerns about how artificial intelligence firms control their powerful systems.

Last week, IPO-bound OpenAI said it would slow the pace of model development while overhauling its research and training systems after company officials were caught unawares when an AI agent being tested hacked Hugging Face.

The agent went on a days-long hacking spree that OpenAI did not notice until well after the threat was contained and the FBI was alerted, Reuters reported.

The investigation comes after a multi-state coalition, including Alabama, sent a letter earlier this month to OpenAI demanding transparency and accountability regarding the incident, Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall’s office said.

Independent investigators brought in to examine the hack of Hugging Face say more than 700 AI agents spun up by the company OpenAI participated in breach.

The number, which has not previously been reported, was disclosed in a report published Wednesday by METR and Redwood Research, two organizations brought in to do an independent investigation into the breach.

The report says OpenAI’s agents also did “extensive research” on how to cover their tracks during the hacking campaign.

The ChatGPT maker is conducting a thorough review with external advisers after the Hugging Face breach, an OpenAI spokesperson said, adding that the company will share a technical report with relevant government authorities and publish findings once the review is complete.

The probe seeks to address whether OpenAI’s “inability or unwillingness to ensure the safety of its products violated Alabama’s consumer protection laws and poses an ongoing risk of substantial harm to the citizens of the state,” Marshall’s office added.

The states demanded in their letter that OpenAI cease and desist from testing activities that led to the hack until “OpenAI shows that it can conduct such activities in a controlled and responsible way.”

“This AI lab leak showed that Alabamians’ and Americans’ worst fears about artificial intelligence are not just theoretical,” Marshall said.

Similar incidents at rivals Anthropic and Meta have fanned concerns about how developers can control increasingly capable AI systems, and intensified US government efforts to improve AI safety as companies race to develop more capable models.

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Turkey’s ruling AKP party has been hostile to Israel for many years. It ties its hostility to its support for Palestinians. However, Turkey’s policy affects more than just the Palestinians; it has been increasingly sympathetic to Hamas over the years.

From Turkey’s point of view, it benefits from supporting Hamas because the Palestinians widely support Hamas. Ankara’s link to Hamas runs even deeper, and likely has roots in the Muslim Brotherhood ideology, which influences both Hamas and the AKP.

These days Turkey’s stance on Israel is beginning to shift. Where once it could look at Israel through the Palestinian lens and condemn Israel at international forums, it may now see Israel as a potential regional rival.

This shift is not lost on Jerusalem. Many parties, both in Israel and abroad, are depicting Turkey as an emerging threat, akin to Iran. This can’t be good news for US policymakers who see both Turkey and Israel as key allies.

This contradiction would not be the first for the US, however. In the past, the US had to balance Saudi Arabia and Israel as allies in the 1980s and 1990s, even when the two were at odds with each other.

A new article at Al Jazeera notes: “Ankara views Israeli attempts to undermine the Syrian transition as having direct repercussions for its national security.” This was written after a recent Israeli airstrike in Syria, which was intended to deter Turkey from expanding its role in Syria. Israel has shifted its priorities in Syria; it has gone from targeting Iranian entrenchment before the fall of the Assad regime to being wary of Turkish entrenchment.

“Therefore, Turkey is no longer seeing Israel solely through the prism of the Palestinian question,” the article notes. “Rather, it increasingly sees it as a national security challenge, with Israeli regional revisionism threatening its interests.”

Israel’s focus in Syria is on Turkish military involvement

Let’s recall how this development occurred. Turkey and Israel have both been led by right-wing and religious parties over the past two decades. In a sense, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have had similar careers. Both have harnessed their countries’ politics and sought to build right-wing, religious coalitions to run countries previously led by more secular, center-left nationalist parties.

This trajectory has become increasingly common all over the world. However, in the specific case of Turkey and Israel, it appears to have led to clashes instead of partnership.

In the past, it was Turkey that appeared to have the upper hand in the region. Turkey’s population is eight times the size of Israel, and its territory is 36 times larger.

Despite this, Israel’s economic power is quickly catching up to Turkey. In fact, Israeli defense companies are outpacing Turkish defense companies. Population and geography matter, but Israel has a more dynamic economy.

In the wake of the Abraham Accords and other developments, Israel may be seen as a rival on various fronts with Turkey.

Breakdown of Israeli-Turkish relations

Let’s go back a few years and recall that Turkey and Israel were once friends from the 1950s to the 1990s. However, the rise of the AKP and Israel’s continuing conflicts led to a rapid decline in relations after 2009. The Israeli raid on the Mavi Marmara, which resulted in the deaths of 10 Turkish citizens, harmed the already fraying ties.

There were some attempts to reconcile the relationship between the two countries. President Isaac Herzog even went to Turkey in 2022, but the attempts at reconciliation didn’t hold. October 7 opened up even more anti-Israel rhetoric from Turkey.

The real story may, in fact, be found in Ankara’s foreign policy and Israel’s own paradigm shift. Turkey once had “zero problems” with its neighbors. The Syrian civil war, however, led to Turkey invading parts of northern Syria. By 2019, Turkey was having a new crisis every week.

Turkey hosted Hamas leaders and offered them the red carpet. This, in turn, threatened Greece and Cyprus, which eventually pushed Israel, Greece, and Cyprus closer together.

Over the years, Turkey became increasingly belligerent in the eastern Mediterranean. Turkey intervened in Libya. It also threatened Saudi Arabia and the UAE. It backed Qatar in the 2017 Gulf crisis. It backed the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, and was outraged by the death of former Egyptian leader Mohammed Morsi in custody.

In 2022, the world saw a decidedly different Turkey. It moved to reconcile with Saudi Arabia and Egypt, and sought to reduce tensions in Libya. Although Turkey was still mobilizing for a larger role in places like Africa, it also had to balance its ties with Ukraine and Russia.

In Syria, Turkey believed the Assad regime would remain. It was handed a new chance in Syria when the Assad regime fell in December 2024.

Turkey’s role in the Islamic world 

Turkey was used to playing a major role on several continents. It was a member of NATO and had a foothold in Europe. It once even considered joining the EU. Years ago, I interviewed Yasar Yakis, who had been the chairman of the EU Committee of the Turkish parliament. Turkey shifted its view from a European concept to one that sought to play a larger role in the Islamic world.

As such, one can see in Ankara’s drive for power as a desire to play a role in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Asia. As a country that inherits some of the policies of the Ottoman Empire and the Caliphate that once sat in Istanbul, Turkey naturally has a global view.

Israel’s foreign policy has not always been a global one. Once upon a time, in the 1950s and 1960s, it had a periphery doctrine when it was surrounded by hostile Arab countries. Later, it was able to broker peace with Egypt and Jordan. With the Trump administration’s help, Israel also made peace with the UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco.

Although Israel has friends in Asia and Europe, it has had to juggle its policies so it focuses only on a few issues at a time. This precarious balance can also be seen in Israel’s struggle to maintain well-staffed embassies abroad, even in the countries it has ties with.

The post-October 7 doctrine has changed Israel’s approach. Now, Israel believes it will have a long-term role in running half of Gaza, as well as a swath of southern Lebanon and a buffer zone in Syria.

The post-October 7 doctrine has changed Israel’s approach. Now, Israel believes it will have a long-term role in running half of Gaza, as well as a swath of southern Lebanon and a buffer zone in Syria.

Turkey is shifting to view Israel as a regional rival

Turkey therefore, has begun to think of Israel as its regional rival. Because of this concern, Turkey has decided to tone down some of its current rhetoric. Turkish officials, such as Foreign Affairs Minister Hakan Fidan, are likely advising Erdogan not to rush into a confrontation at the moment. Gone are the days when Turkey would warn that it would “suddenly” come one night – the rhetorical flourish Erdogan would often use when threatening other countries.

Apparently, Turkey sees the bombing in Syria as a threat, and wonders if Israel may “suddenly” come one night. There is no doubt that, now, some of the cooler heads in Turkey seek to tone down tensions.

The result? Going forward, Turkey and Israel will eye each other across the table, seeing each other more as equals. Gone is the past where Ankara appeared to have an Ottoman-like grip over the Mediterranean and Middle East. Now, it has a rival.

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Israel is not US President Donald Trump’s exception. Jerusalem and the Golan are historic proof of his preference, not of Israel’s immunity. Israel can credit both without confusing gratitude with jurisdiction.

On August 16, Trump ordered the Pentagon to substantially reduce joint military exercises with South Korea. He cited their cost, his relationship with Kim Jong Un and Seoul’s refusal to support American action against Iran. South Korean officials later said the directive surprised both Seoul and parts of the American government.

Iran and the Korean Peninsula belong to different theaters. Trump put them on the same invoice.

The leverage came from within an intact alliance.

Trump commands finite inventories, ranks theaters and reallocates power. American interest sets the bargain; chemistry, prestige and the transaction at hand reprice it. No alliance escapes that arithmetic.

When Trump was asked this year whether weapons destined for Ukraine could be diverted elsewhere, his answer dispensed with euphemism: “We do that all the time.”

The weapon may defend Kyiv. The inventory remains American.

Ukrainian money, commitments and battlefield need do not determine American allocation. Kyiv can secure weapons and still lose priority to another theatre. A military dependency becomes leverage the moment another capital controls its priority.

Denmark is a founding NATO ally, and the US already enjoys extensive military access to Greenland. None of that prevented Trump from repeatedly demanding American control of the territory.

A NATO border entered an American transaction.

Jerusalem has issued no formal position on Greenland, but at working levels Israel has aligned with Copenhagen and Europe. The Israeli interest is direct: normalizing coercion against one Western ally sets a precedent for coercing another. American protection confers no title over allied territory; strategic dependence none over allied decisions.

Ankara maintained relations with Moscow and Tehran, obstructed allied decisions and sustained coercion against Greece and Cyprus. Trump nevertheless moved to rehabilitate Erdogan politically and signaled sanctions relief.

Turkey did not become more reliable. It made itself expensive to lose.

Ankara manufactures relevance by preserving the problems it later offers to mediate. Erdogan can defy Washington in one theatre and sell access in another, as he did again this week on Iran.

India is the larger power, economy and democratic counterweight to China, yet autonomous from Washington. Pakistan offers narrower utility: military authority, access and channels to actors Washington needs to reach. When Washington needs immediate access, it has repeatedly preferred Pakistani usability to Indian autonomy.

Trump revived the bargain. Pakistan maintained access to Washington, Iran, China and the Gulf; when Iran became the priority, those contradictions restored Islamabad’s value.

Pakistan’s contradiction became its product.

Trump turns that reflex into an alliance incentive by rewarding behavior alliances were built to suppress. His most loyal allies are often the safest to squeeze because Washington expects the relationship to survive; difficult partners manufacture scarcity and raise the cost of bypassing them.

Loyalty without optionality is exposure.

Trump can be pro-Israel and pro-Erdogan simultaneously. Strategic support for Israel does not erase Turkish utility in another American calculation.

The relevant evidence is not what Trump says about Israel. It is what he gives Turkey when Turkey becomes useful.

Israel has acted on that principle in Syria: American objections raise the diplomatic cost of an Israeli redline; they confer no vote over it.

For Athens and Nicosia, Turkish power is the threat; for Washington, it remains an instrument in Syria, Iran, the Black Sea and NATO. The United States can recognize an ally’s threat and preserve the actor producing it.

Israel’s dependency on the US

Israel is not South Korea or Ukraine. It commands its own military, intelligence and defense industry and can initiate major operations independently. Yet critical capabilities depend on American replenishment, munitions and production capacity.

Accumulated dependencies need no formal veto; they can create an authorization regime without a treaty ever granting one. Dependency also habituates: assistance becomes assumption, consultation becomes procedure, and Washington acquires standing in decisions that remain Israeli.

Trump’s admiration for Israel remains subordinate to American interest. The Strait of Hormuz, oil prices, American casualties, China, Turkey and domestic politics reorder American priorities. Access to Trump shapes outcomes; it does not control that calculation.

A steadier White House would change the operator, not the dependency.

Washington is larger than Trump. Ankara’s purchase of Russia’s S-400 air defense system removed Turkey from the F-35 program. Trump can rehabilitate Erdogan faster than Washington can arm him: he can reopen the aircraft question, but while the S-400 remains, American law, Congress, the Pentagon, program security and export controls stand between presidential preference and delivery.

Israel’s advantage is its institutional depth in Washington: Jerusalem must use it to hedge Trump, and Israeli capacity to hedge Washington. The same institutions that can block a Turkish F-35 cannot manufacture an interceptor after an Israeli stockpile is empty.

Every critical capability requires four answers: who owns it, who replenishes it, who can withhold it, and how long Israel can operate without it. If one foreign decision can disable it, Israel requires an alternative.

Israel still reads Europe politically and America strategically. That hierarchy is obsolete. American power is greater; European interests are anchored in geography. Washington can pivot. Europe cannot move the Mediterranean.

Crete and Cyprus anchor Israel’s corridor into Europe for energy, cables, shipping and military access. Turkish coercion there strikes Israeli access, not merely Greek or Cypriot interests.

The European Union is Israel’s largest goods trading partner, accounting for nearly one third of its trade. Israeli capabilities now support German and Finnish air and missile defense, Czech air defense and radar, Dutch long-range fires, and Greek cooperation across air defense, drones, missiles, maritime security and production.

Iran and Turkey give that architecture its threat logic: Iranian missiles, drones and proliferation beyond the Middle East; Turkish forward power from Syria to occupied northern Cyprus, directly across Israel’s Mediterranean corridor.

Israeli capability is becoming European defense capacity; European geography, industry and markets extend Israeli depth.

A pro-Israel president is an asset. A security doctrine that requires one is a national vulnerability.

The writer is Founder and Principal of Line of State, a strategic practice working with governments, institutions and decision-makers on strategy, risk, access and security decisions in high-stakes environments.

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Israeli entertainment continues to attract international attention, but the industry is facing challenges that could affect future productions, Jerusalem Post film critic Hannah Brown said on the latest episode of The Jerusalem Playlist.

This episode examines the current state of Israeli television, including the success of series such as Fauda, which will arrive on Netflix internationally on September 8. Brown explained that while Israeli television remains highly creative and continues to produce successful shows, producers are concerned about reduced budgets, uncertainty surrounding public broadcaster Kan, and a decline in international co-production funding. Because television projects can take years to develop, the impact of these issues may only become visible in several years.

Strength of Israeli television

Brown highlighted the long-standing strength of Israeli television, pointing to the success of In Treatment, a series built around conversations between a psychologist and patients that was later adapted internationally, including by HBO. She said the show demonstrated how Israeli creators have been able to develop original concepts that are both cost-effective and emotionally compelling.

The discussion also focused on Fauda season five and how the October 7 attacks reshaped the production. Brown said the creators scrapped their original plans and rewrote the season to reflect how the events would affect the show’s counterterrorism unit. The season includes flashback episodes depicting October 7, which were described as emotionally difficult for the cast and crew to film.

Brown also discussed Gal Gadot’s upcoming Amazon Prime Video thriller, in which she plays a London lawyer forced into a dangerous situation after her son is kidnapped. She praised Gadot’s strengths in action roles and noted the involvement of director Kevin Macdonald, who won an Oscar for One Day in September.

The episode concluded with a discussion about controversy surrounding the novel Upward Bound, attributed to autistic author Woody Brown. Brown examined questions raised over facilitated communication methods while emphasizing the importance of supporting genuine communication tools for people on the autism spectrum.

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Col. (res.) Matan Kahana, a senior member of the Yashar! party led by Gadi Eisenkot, said on Wednesday that former IDF officer Ofer Winter is “very clearly in the Netanyahu bloc,” while calling on smaller parties seeking to replace Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to unite or withdraw from the election race, he told 103FM.

Kahana spoke with Gideon Oko and Amichai Attali on Wednesday morning and reacted angrily to footage from Tuesday showing MK Zvi Sukkot smashing a memorial in the West Bank. He also addressed Winter’s entry into politics and the emerging changes in the party landscape ahead of the upcoming election.

“These images are a disgrace, and this is anarchy,” Kahana said. “A member of Knesset, a person who did not serve in the IDF, is acting in such an anarchistic way. It harms the State of Israel, and it is shameful that such a party purports to represent the religious-Zionist public.”

Kahana supports smashing memorials to terrorists

Kahana said he believed such memorials should be removed, but not in the manner Sukkot had done.

“These memorials to terrorists need to be smashed, no question about it. It only shows whom our enemies glorify, but we are a state: We have an army, police, and a government. If this were important to the right-wing government, it would order the IDF to destroy these memorials,” the former minister said.

“It is amazing to see how something that was so firmly in the consensus has become controversial,” he continued. “It is clear that Zvi Sukkot did this to get a video and attention, and he does not care that this is not how a properly functioning country is supposed to operate. Smotrich’s party is showing that it does not care about the institutions of the state when a person like this endangers IDF troops and manipulates them.”

Winter is in the Netanyahu bloc, Kahana says

Kahana acknowledged that he had not watched Tuesday’s launch of the Amcha Israel party headed by Ofer Winter. Asked about the new political framework, he said: “I have known him since the days when we served together in Sayeret Matkal. He is very clearly in the Netanyahu bloc. What is refreshing is that at least someone in his bloc does not support the draft evasion and desertion of our haredi brothers, and that is already refreshing news.”

“For us, this is less of an issue,” Kahana said. “We are focused on building a political body that will replace Netanyahu, and in my assessment, Winter is in the bloc that will strengthen him.”

Kahana said the smaller parties in the bloc seeking political change should either merge or withdraw from the race. He said this also applied to his good friend and longtime political partner Benny Gantz.

“I have a lot of affection for Benny and gratitude for having been part of his party,” Kahana said.

Small parties should unite or withdraw

He acknowledged that the two have not been in contact recently and questioned Gantz’s current political positioning.

“Based on his latest statements, it is difficult to determine which bloc he belongs to and whether he intends to replace Netanyahu,” Kahana said.

“Anyone who does not have six seats should either unite or withdraw,” he added.

Kahana said the same message applied to another good friend, Chili Tropper, who joined Yoaz Hendel in a separate party.

“Exactly what I said about Gantz applies to Chili, even though he is a good and worthy person,” Kahana said.

Kahana was also asked about his friend Ayelet Shaked.

“I am very friendly with her, but I am less interested in giving her political advice. She is a serious woman, and I do not hesitate to pick up the phone and call her, but not in political contexts. I do not advise her,” he said.

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“We cannot close our eyes and say there is no Iran, there is no Russia. There are.”

Nargiz Mammadova, a research fellow in international relations at the CASPIA Center, was describing the reality Azerbaijan confronts whenever it looks at the map. Speaking with The Media Line in Jerusalem, she said decisions made in Moscow or Tehran cannot be dismissed as distant developments. Both countries border Azerbaijan, placing instability in either one directly inside Baku’s security calculations.

Mammadova was among 13 Muslim professionals from Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan brought to Israel by Sharaka, a nongovernmental organization founded after the 2020 Abraham Accords to promote people-to-people diplomacy between Israelis and communities across the Arab and Muslim worlds.

Holocaust remembrance and meetings about Israeli society were part of the visit, but regional security was never far from the discussion. For the Azerbaijani participants, Israel is one element of a crowded diplomatic picture that also includes Russia, Iran, Turkey, Armenia and the wider South Caucasus.

The result is a foreign policy built less around choosing sides than keeping several doors open. Azerbaijan buys Israeli weapons, regards Turkey as a vital ally, trades with Russia, shares a long border with Iran and is pursuing peace with Armenia after decades of conflict.

Azerbaijan is surrounded by countries at war

“If you look to the map in the South Caucasus, Azerbaijan has five neighbors, and two of them are into war situation, or kind of war situation,” Mammadova said.

She described the ability to work with competing powers as a defining characteristic of Azerbaijani diplomacy. Baku, she argued, cannot afford to organize its foreign policy around one dominant relationship.

Mammadova applied the same reasoning to Armenia, saying agreements between governments must be accompanied by “building bridges between people” and greater trust between the two societies.

Farid Shukurlu, an international law and security researcher and nonresident fellow at the Research Institute for European and American Studies, told The Media Line that his criticism was directed at the Iranian regime and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), not at Iranian society.

IRGC targeted Azerbaijan

“Even though Azerbaijan’s position was formally neutrality, the country was still targeted by the IRGC in the Nakhchivan enclave,” he said.

Nakhchivan is an Azerbaijani exclave separated from the rest of the country by Armenian territory. Azerbaijan said four drones arriving from Iran struck the region on March 5, injuring four people and damaging Nakhchivan International Airport and a school. Iran denied responsibility and promised an investigation.

The incident demonstrated, in Shukurlu’s view, that avoiding direct participation in a conflict does not necessarily protect Azerbaijan from pressure or military spillover from its southern neighbor.

Those concerns have contributed to stronger defense ties with Israel. Azerbaijan has purchased Israeli weapons for years and used Israeli-made systems during its conflicts with Armenian forces over Nagorno-Karabakh.

Shukurlu said “the military cooperation between Azerbaijan and Israel is at an all-time high,” but rejected suggestions that Baku would allow the relationship to turn Azerbaijani territory into a base for military action.

“It’s also in Azerbaijan’s national security concept not to get dragged into regional conflicts,” he said. “Azerbaijani territory will never be used against a third state.”

Balancing relations with Israel, Turkey

Baku faces a different balancing problem when relations deteriorate between Israel and Turkey. Ankara remains one of Azerbaijan’s closest political and security partners, while Israel has become an important supplier of military technology.

Shukurlu said Azerbaijani officials see no reason to sacrifice either relationship.

“Azerbaijan is not going to give up on Israel, Azerbaijan is not going to give up on Turkey, because these countries are equally important to our security, to our existence, and to our image in the international arena,” he said.

Energy makes the triangle even harder to separate.

Ibrahim Mammadov, head of the Turkic-Western Engagement Initiative and a visiting research fellow at the Danube Institute, pointed to the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, which carries crude oil from Azerbaijan through Georgia to Turkey’s Mediterranean port of Ceyhan. Some of that oil is then loaded onto tankers bound for Israel.

“I do not believe that it will ever stop because, for Azerbaijan, it’s an extremely important pipeline,” he told The Media Line.

Closing the route would hurt Azerbaijan by restricting one of its principal export channels and Israel by reducing a major source of crude oil. Turkey receives transit and port benefits, while the state-owned Turkish Petroleum Corporation holds a stake in the pipeline consortium.

The same network that binds the three countries together economically also gives Baku a reason to prevent disputes between Israel and Turkey from becoming direct confrontations.

Azerbaijan has already hosted several rounds of talks between Israeli and Turkish officials seeking to prevent clashes in Syria, where both countries maintain competing security interests.

“We know that there have been formal and informal talks that were held in Baku,” Mammadov said.

He wants Azerbaijan to continue serving as a meeting place when its two partners cannot speak easily elsewhere.

“I hope they can be found in the middle ground.”

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DAMASCUS, Syria (The Media Line) – Hikmat al-Hijri, a spiritual leader of Syria’s Druze community, sparked widespread controversy Tuesday after describing the Druze as an “inseparable part of the State of Israel,” marking a significant escalation in his rhetoric toward Israel amid continuing tensions between forces aligned with him in the southern province of Sweida and the Syrian government in Damascus.  

Speaking during a gathering in Sweida on Monday, in remarks that circulated widely on Tuesday, August 25, al-Hijri said the Druze were an “inseparable part of the State of Israel,” adding that there was common ground with Israel “even in faith.” He also spoke positively about Israel’s model of state-building and its approach to protecting its interests.  

Al-Hijri also suggested that developments concerning Sweida could emerge “within days,” without elaborating on their nature, as the province remains the focus of intensifying regional and international diplomatic activity.  

The remarks come amid a gradual hardening of al-Hijri’s position on Sweida’s political future. In recent months, he has repeatedly spoken about the right to self-determination and the possibility of establishing an entity separate from the central government in Damascus. He has also raised the possibility that the province could eventually come under the protection of another country or join another state.  

Al-Hijri says international involvement necessary to reach solution in Sweida

In his latest remarks, al-Hijri also addressed the situation in Sweida over the past several months, saying the province’s residents were “in one trench” and pointing to the losses resulting from the clashes that have gripped the area.

He said that before the outbreak of violence, the demands of Sweida’s residents centered on establishing a democratic, civil state that would guarantee the rights of all communities and refrain from discriminating among Syrians on religious or sectarian grounds.  

At the same time, however, al-Hijri stressed the need for international involvement in reaching a solution for Sweida, arguing that regional developments and understandings among international powers would help shape the province’s future.  

Relations between al-Hijri and Damascus have remained tense, while conflicting reports have emerged in recent weeks over whether negotiations are underway between the two sides. Media reports have pointed to contacts aimed at reaching an arrangement governing security and administrative relations between Sweida and the Syrian government.

Sources close to al-Hijri, however, have denied that direct negotiations are taking place, while acknowledging US-mediated efforts concerning specific issues, including the fate of detainees.  

The timing of al-Hijri’s remarks adds to their significance. They came days after a Syrian-Israeli meeting in Jordan mediated by the United States, part of efforts to deescalate tensions between Damascus and Israel and discuss security arrangements in southern Syria.  

The comments also come amid growing Israeli involvement in issues concerning Syria’s Druze community. Israel intervened militarily during clashes in Sweida in July 2025, carrying out strikes in Damascus and elsewhere while saying that protecting the Druze was among the objectives of its intervention.  

Al-Hijri has repeatedly thanked Israel for its position. His rhetoric has since evolved from calls for international protection and self-determination toward more explicit references to Israel as a potential player in determining Sweida’s future.

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Nickolay Mladenov, director-general of the Peace Council, censured both Israel and Hamas for their failure to uphold the terms of the ceasefire in a Wednesday statement to the United Nations Security Council. 

“Will another strike on a munitions depot stop Hamas from rearming or tightening its grip on Gaza?” Mladenov asked. “It will not.”

Addressing Hamas’s activities, Mladenov asserted that “every weapon carried, every tunnel still worked on, and every convoy still obstructed, sets the process back…it will be Palestinian civilians, women and children, who will bear the consequences.”

“Ceasefires that deliver nothing visible are not sustained by patience; they are only exhausted by it,” he concluded.

Mladenov also told the UNSC that, for the first time, Hamas and other armed factions in the Gaza Strip have agreed to surrender their weapons and transfer full governing authority, both civilian and security.

The security cabinet approved last month the launch of the pilot phase of a plan to introduce the Peace Council into the Gaza Strip, as part of a broader effort to restore basic services and humanitarian aid and establish civilian infrastructure in areas that are not under Hamas control.

During the security cabinet discussion, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich supported the move, while National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir opposed it.

Hamas agrees to disarm, BoP’s Mladenov claims 

Under the approved plan, the first phase will begin in the Rafah area. Temporary structures will be established to house Palestinian residents, alongside the restoration of basic services and the provision of humanitarian aid.

Anyone seeking to live in the designated compounds will undergo a strict security screening process intended to ensure that they are not affiliated with Hamas or other terrorist organizations.

As part of the discussion, the cabinet also approved the deployment of an international stabilization force in Gaza as part of preparations to implement the plan on the ground.

This post was originally published on here. 

Marvel has a new franchise crossover, and it isn’t the one Disney is marketing. Over the past week, more than 20 actors with Marvel Cinematic Universe credits – Benedict Cumberbatch (Doctor Strange), Mark Ruffalo (the Hulk), Don Cheadle (War Machine), Ian McKellen, whose X-Men run predates the MCU but whose fandom overlaps it – signed onto “Freedom for Marwan,” a campaign demanding the release of Marwan Barghouti from Israeli prison.

The post went up on Instagram, tagged #MCU #Avengers, aimed with some precision at an audience that knows these people as superheroes and not as newly minted foreign-policy authorities.

This is not a new campaign. Barghouti’s family and UK-based advocacy groups launched “Free Marwan” in December, and it collected north of 200 signatures from novelists, musicians, and film actors before the superheroes arrived.

What’s new is the branding. Someone decided the fastest route to a younger, historically illiterate audience runs through the MCU fan account, not the literary supplement. It is a genuinely modern piece of message discipline, and it deserves to be examined as such rather than waved off as showbiz noise.

What the campaign doesn’t sign its name to

The “Freedom for Marwan” statement is built, like its December predecessor, on a request for signatures – dozens of famous names, printed in full, each one lending credibility to the next. Cumberbatch is identified by his role. Ruffalo by his. The campaign understands the value of a name attached to a face.

It extends no such courtesy to the five people Marwan Barghouti was convicted of murdering.

An Israeli court did not take the state’s word for this. In May 2004, a three-judge panel in Tel Aviv heard the evidence and convicted Barghouti on five counts of murder, arising from three attacks: the June 2001 shooting of a Greek Orthodox monk, Tsibouktsakis Germanus, on the Jerusalem–Ma’aleh Adumim highway; the January 2002 shooting of Yoela Chen in Givat Ze’ev; and the March 2002 grenade-and-gun attack on the Seafood Market restaurant in Tel Aviv, which killed Eli Dahan, Yosef Habi, and Salim Barakat, and wounded 25 more.

The same panel acquitted him of 21 further murder counts across 33 other attacks – not for lack of guilt in the campaign’s telling, but for lack of evidence tying him personally to the trigger. The court still found he led the organization, al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, that carried out the broader campaign.

Salim Barakat is worth sitting with for a moment, because his name complicates the “Palestinian versus Israeli” framing the campaign leans on. He was an Arab Israeli, killed alongside two Jewish patrons at a restaurant table.

The Free Marwan campaign’s own biography page, by outside accounts of it, presents Barghouti as a “husband and father” and “nation builder” and simply does not mention what a court found him responsible for. That’s not a simplification. It’s a redaction, and every celebrity who signs the letter without independently checking the verdict is co-signing the redaction, whether they know it or not.

Ignorance, or something worse

I don’t think most of the names on that list are antisemites. I think most of them are people accustomed to lending their fame to causes vetted by someone else’s staff, and this cause arrived pre-packaged with a Nelson Mandela comparison that made due diligence feel unnecessary. Robben Island photo ops. Desmond Tutu quotes recycled from a 2013 campaign launch. The emotional architecture does the thinking, so the signatory doesn’t have to.

That is a real distinction from malice, and it is also not much of a defense. A five-minute search – the Washington Post’s contemporaneous trial coverage, the court’s own findings, the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s public accounting – would have surfaced the same five names I’ve just listed. 

Cumberbatch and Ruffalo did not have to dig. They had to decline to look away. A smaller number of repeat organizers behind these campaigns know the record cold and use the Mandela framing anyway, because they’ve calculated, correctly so far, that it works better than the truth.

Whose grief doesn’t trend

My daughter Alisa was murdered by Palestine Islamic Jihad in April 1995, on a bus near Kfar Darom. I have spent 30 years arguing, in this space and elsewhere, that the men who plan and order these attacks do not stop being murderers because a peace process needs them released, or because a campaign needs them mythologized. I am not going to pretend Alisa’s case is uniquely illustrative here. It isn’t the case at issue. Barghouti was never charged in her killing.

What her case and Salim Barakat’s and Yoela Chen’s and Eli Dahan’s and Yosef Habi’s and the murdered monk Germanus’s cases share is simpler and, I’d argue, more damning for the campaign: none of them get to sign anything. They don’t get an Instagram post. They don’t get their profession listed under their name. The asymmetry is the whole story – a campaign that trades in the currency of famous names, built around the erasure of the five names a court of law took the trouble to establish beyond reasonable doubt.

Nelson Mandela was never convicted of ordering the murder of a restaurant patron. The comparison was always doing more work than the facts could bear. It is doing that work again this week, with better production values and a Marvel logo.

The writer is an attorney and president of the Religious Zionists of America-Mizrachi. He is the father of Alisa Flatow, murdered in a 1995 Palestine Islamic Jihad terrorist attack, and author of A Father’s Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terror. He’s a new oleh (immigrant to Israel) dividing his time between New Jersey and Jerusalem.

This post was originally published on here. 

Recently, Kalman Liebskind, one of the founding journalists of Makor Rishon, wrote a piece positing that people who no longer live in Israel who are returning to vote have a lot of nerve.

In that piece, which appears in Hebrew, he wrote: “The people coming back to vote are doing something profoundly immoral. They don’t live here, they didn’t fight in the war, they’ve chosen not to be part of this society – so they have no right to decide who will govern us.” While I have full respect for Liebeskind’s right to feel the way he does, I strongly disagree, on a number of counts, with both his premise and his conclusions.

First of all, if those who choose to live abroad have not renounced their Israeli citizenship, then according to Israeli law they are fully entitled to vote if they present themselves at a polling station on election day. There is nothing immoral about their doing so.

The law gives them the right to vote and, quite frankly, I have always been impressed with Israeli citizens living abroad who still feel so strongly about what is happening here that they are willing to bear the cost of traveling to the country for one day simply to exercise their legal right to vote.

By contrast, as someone living here who holds dual Israel-US citizenship, I cannot see myself ever being willing to spend the time and money to travel to the US simply to vote. If America would eliminate mail-in balloting, I would simply not vote. The fact that Israelis living abroad feel otherwise is, quite frankly, impressive.

Of course, if there is a groundswell of opinion that the law should be changed, then those who feel strongly about this should work on changing the law. However, someone exercising his or her right under the law cannot be classified as immoral simply for doing so.

Secondly, Liebskind makes assumptions about these people which could simply be untrue. For example, when he wrote, “they didn’t fight in the war,” while it may be true that they did not fight in the current war, it is certainly possible and even probable that they or their children may have fought in previous wars; after all, we certainly have had our share of them. It may well have been a factor that led them to leave Israel, having already experienced the fear of the “knock on the door” once in their lives (or perhaps even the actual “knock”) and not wanting to have that experience ever again.

‘Chosen not to be part of this society’

Similarly, when he wrote, “they’ve chosen not to be part of this society,” what does that really mean? I would venture to say that the overwhelming majority of these people still have family living here. No doubt most travel here with some frequency, perhaps send their children here every summer to spend time with grandparents and cousins, as well as share some of their financial success with philanthropic institutions that operate in Israel. Does that not qualify them yet as part of this society? I would submit that it does.

In addition, of course, one needs to be very careful when stratifying who can vote by whether or not they have chosen to be part of this society. There are those here in Israel who would argue that certain elements within Israel have made choices not to be part of this society as well.

Does Liebskind want to also apply that same standard to citizens living here? It seems to me that such a “litmus test” starts us on a slippery slope toward autocracy that would be better avoided if we want to preserve democracy.

Lastly, it would appear that Liebskind has lost sight of worldwide Jewish demographics. If we were to sit across a table from each other, I would ask him whether it is possible for a people whose global population is just 15.8 million people to be completely detached from the country where 50% of us live?

Have we not internalized the concept that “when one Jew is injured, all Jews feel the pain?” This is an ancient tenet of Jewish peoplehood and mutual responsibility, often traced back to teachings from the classical sages, such as Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai in the Mechilta, expressing that the Jewish community functions as an interconnected collective. This shared vulnerability reflects a profound, interconnected sense of peoplehood where violence against one member is felt as an injury to the whole. And the corollary is also true: we have a responsibility to care for each other wherever we are in the world.

We, who compose the 15.8 million Jews in the world, are one small community, older than any other yet considerably fewer in numbers than normal generational growth would have predicted. 

Therefore, it is simply not honest to take the position that Israeli citizens living abroad who come here only to vote are immoral. On the contrary, their doing so is very much in the spirit of Jewish unity and serves as an incredible lesson of responsibility being taught to their children and grandchildren, that we all, no matter where we live, have a stake in each other’s lives and a moral obligation to demonstrate that commitment whenever the opportunity presents itself.

To those who will travel here to vote on election day, I would say thank you for continuing to care about us and for remembering, “Kol Yisrael arevim zeh bazeh,” the Hebrew phrase that signifies a profound, mutual responsibility where every Jewish person acts as a guarantor for one another. We are grateful for your support and encouragement wherever you may reside.

The writer, a 42-year resident of Jerusalem, is a former national president of the Association of Americans and Canadians in Israel, a past chairperson of the board of the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies, and a Board Member of the Israel-America Chamber of Commerce (AMCHAM).

This post was originally published on here. 

Washington’s decision on Monday to remove Syria from its list of state sponsors of terrorism has dealt American victims of Syrian-sponsored terrorism “a heavy blow,” Aryeh Portnoy, a lawyer from Crowell & Moring representing American victims against state sponsors of terrorism, told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday.

The removal, posted on the US Treasury’s website, took effect after a 45-day congressional review period triggered when Trump formally notified Congress on July 8 of his intention to rescind the designation.

“These actions were all taken in recognition of the positive actions taken and further commitments by the Syrian government under President Ahmed al-Sharaa to fully distance Syria from acts of international terrorism,” US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement.

American victims of Syrian terror feel move diminishes their experience

Though some have argued that the move will allow Damascus the financial recovery needed to bring stability for a country that has suffered more than a decade of civil war and a dictatorship responsible for multiple crimes against its own people, Portnoy said that declaring Syria “open for business without accounting for the Americans whose lives were destroyed by Syrian state-sponsored terrorism” was devastating to its victims.

American victims and their families who have obtained a final judgment in a US district court against a designated state sponsor of terrorism are meant to be compensated through the US Victims of State Sponsored Terrorism Fund (USVSST Fund), using seized and forfeited assets and settlements from companies that have violated US sanctions, but it remains unclear whether Syria will be required to pay any amount toward outstanding judgments or future lawsuits.

Notably, the Anti-Defamation League is still in the process of suing Syria on behalf of 130 US citizens who were killed or injured on October 7 and family members of American victims. Launched in July 2024,  less than half a year before Ahmed al-Sharaa’s HTS forces seized control from Bashar al-Assad, the lawsuit alleges that Syria, along with North Korea and Iran, “provided material support to Hamas that enabled it to commit atrocities in Israel on October 7, 2023.”

For example, in Colvin v. Syrian Arab Republic, a US court ruled that the Syrian regime must pay out $302.5 million in damages to the family of Marie Colvin, a war correspondent killed in a targeted attack in Homs in 2012.

Other countries who were removed from list had to compensate US victims

Though now under a different leadership, other countries have been expected to pay out millions to victims as part of an agreement to be taken off the list of state sponsors of terrorism. In 2008, for example, Libya compensated families of US victims of Libyan terror attacks, including the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988, two years after it was removed from the list as part of a $1.8 billion deal.

“[American] victims now can only hope their government will not forget them, and that it intends to address the claims and judgments Congress allowed them to pursue in US courts, and not render that commitment to help them seek justice an empty promise,” Portnoy said, adding that “‘it also is unclear how Syria and its new business partners will be protected from the claims of hundreds, if not thousands, of judgment creditors who will need to identify other ways to enforce their judgments if left unaddressed.”

Dr. Tamim Khromachou, the Syrian-Alawite president of the Levant Council of the United States and the Americans for Levant Foundation, told The Post that delisting Syria does not address the sectarian violence in Syria, and could inadvertently strengthen actors responsible for abuses seen in recent years, though it would undoubtedly be beneficial for Syria’s economy and diplomatic efforts.

“It is also important to remember that Syria moved from the political dictatorship of the Assad regime into a period of civil and sectarian violence while Syria was under the same terrorism-related designations. So, ultimately, the designation itself does not determine which direction Syria takes,” Khromachou said. “The will of the new authorities, the nature of the institutions they build, and the commitment of those supporting Syria’s transition will be far more consequential.”

“Removing the designation could provide an important opportunity for Syria, but that opportunity needs to be accompanied by meaningful safeguards, accountability, and guarantees that the emerging state will protect all Syrians regardless of their sect or identity,” he shared.

Israeli expert sees move as positive to tackle Syrian sectarian violence

Though minorities in Syria may waver in how they view this latest move, Dr. Ely Karmon, a senior researcher at The International Institute for Counter-Terrorism at Reichman University, told The Post that Washington’s decision could only help tackle the bad actors involved in the sectarian attacks.

Explaining that the Islamist groups operating in Syria hadn’t been taken as quickly by the “charismatic” Sharaa as European and American leadership, Karmon made clear he didn’t believe that Sharaa’s government had been responsible for the sectarian violence but said that Washington’s decision to delist Syria would likely encourage him to act more strongly against it.

“The Syrian army was not yet really under control, and still is not completely under control,” he said.

The European Union has been slower than the US to remove sanctions, and Sharaa will need to prove he can provide a stable future for Syria in order to see the country freed from the financial restraints, he explained. With the removal of US sanctions, Damascus will have more breathing room to create that stability, he argued. 

This post was originally published on here. 

The United States designated Palestine Action on Wednesday as a terrorist group, as US President Donald Trump’s administration seeks to crack down on left-wing groups in its counterterrorism efforts.

The action comes after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio last month told officials from more than 60 countries that Washington would seek to ​refocus international counterterrorism efforts on what he called “far-left terror.” The conference sparked Democratic concerns that the ‌Trump administration is politicizing counterterrorism efforts and diverting resources from other extremist threats.

Trump singled ​out the anti-fascist antifa movement on the campaign trail in 2024, and vowed to take action against left-wing groups he accuses of fomenting violence after ⁠the killing of conservative activist and Trump ally Charlie Kirk last year.

“Far-left extremists, their fronts, and their enablers should be on notice: We will bring the full weight of our economic tools to bear,” Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent said in a statement on Wednesday.

“Political terrorism has no place in our society, and we will continue to cut the financial lifelines of these groups until they are eliminated.”

Italy-based entity sanctioned for supplying antifa, other far-left groups

The US Treasury Department on Wednesday also imposed sanctions on an Italy-based entity it accused of supplying digital architecture, tools and services for antifa and other far-left groups.

Britain has also previously banned Palestine Action as a terrorist organization. Palestine Action had increasingly targeted Israel‑linked defense companies in Britain, especially Israel’s largest defense firm Elbit Systems.

Responding to the US move on Wednesday, Huda Ammori, co-founder of Palestine Action, said the group’s activities “have always been about saving lives by disrupting the Israeli war machine.”

“The fact that Trump is now taking inspiration from Britain’s repression of the movement for Palestinian freedom exposes just how dangerous this ban is and should be a wake-up call to anyone who cares about free speech and civil liberties,” Ammori said in a statement to Reuters.

UK Supreme Court to hear appeal against Palestine Action ban

The United Kingdom’s Supreme Court has said it will hear an appeal against a lower court ​ruling that Britain’s decision to ban campaign group ‌Palestine Action as a terrorist organization was lawful.

The US. Treasury Department also imposed sanctions on Wednesday on the transnational group Masar Badil, saying it operates as a front for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. The latter group had already been designated by the US. as a Foreign Terrorist Organization.

This post was originally published on here. 

 Tim Curry, the baritone-voiced British actor who pranced to movie fame as a singing, lingerie-clad “sweet transvestite” in the 1975 cult classic “The Rocky Horror Picture Show,” has died at the age of 80, Variety and other outlets reported.

A cause of death was not immediately given, but Curry had been in ill health for some time.

Curry appeared in numerous movies, often as a hammy villain, was nominated three times for a Tony Award for Broadway roles, and performed voice work in many animated films and TV shows.

But his best-known role was Dr. Frank N. Furter, which came in his debut film, the outrageous, crowd-pleasing horror-comedy-musical “The Rocky Horror Picture Show,” co-starring Susan Sarandon and Barry Bostwick.

“I’m not much of a man by the light of day. But by night I’m one hell of a lover. I’m just a sweet transvestite from transsexual Transylvania,” Curry sang in one scene as he strutted around with garish eye shadow and lipstick, in a skimpy black outfit complete with black stockings and garter belt.

In a 1975 television interview, Curry noted the risk of having his career defined by such an outlandish role – a prescient worry, as it turned out. “When I read it, I just thought it was very, very witty and funny,” Curry said, although he confessed to some initial reluctance.

“I mean, I was hesitant in that, if it worked, it might be a difficult thing to shake off. But, really, I’ve always thought that it (a part) wasn’t worth doing unless you took a risk,” Curry said.

Among his other films were “Charlie’s Angels” (2000), “Muppet Treasure Island” (1996), “The Shadow” (1994), “The Three Musketeers” (1993), “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York” (1992), “Clue” (1985), “Legend” (1985) and “Annie” (1982).

Some of Curry’s best work was on Broadway

Curry did much of his best work on stage. He was nominated for a Tony, Broadway’s top honor, in 1981 for his role as Mozart in “Amadeus,” a tale of the great composer’s interaction with jealous rival Salieri. Curry was also nominated for a Tony in 1993 for “My Favorite Year” and in 2005 for his role as King Arthur in the zany “Monty Python’s Spamalot.”

Possessing a rich baritone voice, he was in demand as a voice actor for animated films and TV shows. He won a Daytime Emmy Award in 1991 for his voice work on the animated “Peter Pan & the Pirates.”

With his sinister grin and menacing laugh, Curry was frequently cast in Hollywood films as a villain – sometimes with comic overtones, which let him deliver the type of over-the-top performances for which he was famed.

“I do love those roles – they’re always the best written,” Curry told interviewer Andrew Kay in 2011.

He conceded that some of his movies were mediocre, singling out 1995’s “Congo,” a tale of diamond mines and killer gorillas.

“I was really very bad in it,” Curry said. “I won a Razzy award for one of the worst performances of the year – and I richly deserved it, too.”

From Cheshire to Birmingham to New York to LA

Curry was born in the English village of Grappenhall, Cheshire, on April 19, 1946. His father, a Royal Navy chaplain, died when he was 12. His mother was a school secretary.

Curry studied drama at Birmingham University.

In 1973, he landed the part of Dr. Frank N. Furter in the original London stage version of “The Rocky Horror Show.” He performed the play in New York and Los Angeles before it was made into a film, renamed as “The Rocky Horror Picture Show.”

The movie was not an instant hit but won a cult following in midnight screenings in New York City and elsewhere, with audience members often dressing up as “Rocky Horror” characters.

Curry withdrew from a British stage production in 2011 due to ill health. In 2013, his agent said that he had suffered a stroke but was recovering “in great humor.” From then on he used a wheelchair and reduced his workload. In 2024, he did, however, return to the big screen, appearing in the horror film “Stream.”

Curry, who lived in Los Angeles, never married and had no children. A composer and a singer, Curry also performed with his own rock band and released a handful of albums.

This post was originally published on here. 

Palestinian police officers set up a checkpoint in Area C of the West Bank, where they were not authorized to operate, and unlawfully arrested a reservist IDF soldier who was traveling in the area on Sunday, military sources confirmed to The Jerusalem Post.

According to a KAN News report, there are two versions of the story regarding the incident. The first version released by the army claimed that the Palestinian police came to the aid of the Israeli who was in Area B and facing immediate danger. This was thought to be the follow-up to a previous report that an armed Israeli was located in the Ein Arik region of Area B. 

However, upon further investigation, the army amended its statement to say that the police arrested the reservist on their own initiative, subsequently handing him over to the IDF. 

The second version of the story, per KAN, is the testimony of the reservist himself. He claimed that he encountered a Palestinian checkpoint in Area C, where Palestinian police sprayed him with pepper spray and violently arrested him, confiscating his weapon. He was then taken on an approximately 20-minute drive to the outskirts of Ramallah, at which point he was allowed to speak with an Israeli military representative.

Reservist claimed Palestinian police beat him, took his car, glasses

Soon afterward, the IDF took him into custody. Per the KAN report, the reservist claimed that he was beaten, his glasses were taken away, and his vehicle was confiscated by the Palestinian police as well. The IDF later returned the vehicle to him. 

Finally, on Wednesday, the military officially amended its statement to clarify that the reservist was in Area C, not in Area B, and that the checkpoint in question was unlawful, aligning the two previously disparate accounts of the event. 

This post was originally published on here. 

Dolly Parton’s Wikipedia page was allegedly targeted by vandals with antisemitic content and offensive modifications within an hour of the public announcement of her death at age 80 on Tuesday.

As millions around the world mourned the loss of the legendary cultural icon, social media users shared screenshots of modifications to her profile.

This is depraved.

Dolly Parton’s Wikipedia page was vandalised with a swastika and the words ‘Jew lover’ just hours after she died, we understand.

These vile edits are no longer there, but the idea that someone would choose to exploit her death to spread antisemitic abuse is… pic.twitter.com/3ZKbgJBqPa

— Campaign Against Antisemitism (@antisemitism) August 26, 2026

The alterations included replacing her profile photo with an image of a Nazi swastika, changing her name to “Jew lover,” and altering her display title to reference Adam Lanza, the perpetrator of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, that claimed the lives of 20 children and six adult staff members.

One screenshot shared on X/Twitter captured a Google search result listing her Wikipedia page title as “Dolly Parton – Adam Lanza was a hero.” The edits were quickly identified and reversed using Wikipedia’s revision history safeguards, restoring the page to its proper state.

Whoever hacked Dolly Parton’s wikipedia to re-route it to the sandy hook shooter genuinely i hope you rot for the rest of your life pic.twitter.com/CaSSZ0tihj

— bella ☭ (@bellanati0n) August 25, 2026

Dolly Parton Wikipedia page open-source ‘hacked’ with antisemitic content

While some social media posts  characterized the profile as having been “hacked,” Wikipedia functions as an open-source collaborative encyclopedia that allows public contributions and edits.

Someone temporarily vandalized Dolly Parton’s Wikipedia page. They swapped her photo for a Nazi swastika and changed the heading to “Jew lover.”

This is why I hate fcking people.

No words. pic.twitter.com/UA2swvM4Rv

— Gina Milan (@ginamilan_) August 25, 2026

During major breaking news events, sudden surges in traffic can temporarily outpace active administrative oversight, allowing opportunistic users to manually alter text fields, display titles, and images until platform moderators or automated filters execute rollbacks and lock the page history.

This post was originally published on here. 

In recent weeks a crisis between Turkey and Israel over Syria policy has shed a spotlight on US Ambassador Tom Barrack. Barrack is the ambassador to Turkey and the US Envoy to Iraq and Syria. This puts him in a unique position in regards to US policy in the Middle East.

Barrack is considered close to US President Donald Trump. Therefore, this crisis is part of the personal diplomacy that Trump has conducted as part of what can be seen as the wider global Trump doctrine – the White House is not doing policy conventionally, it leans into personal diplomacy and a willingness to think outside the box.

The Trump administration has been thinking outside the box on Syria policy. It was quick to follow advice from Saudi Arabia and also likely from Turkey in regards to embracing the new Syrian government after the fall of the Assad regime. Trump met with the new Syrian President Ahmad al-al-Sharaa and took a liking to him.

In Jerusalem the new government in Damascus was met with intensive skepticism and eventually hostility. In the beginning when the Assad regime fell, Jerusalem appeared to be taken by surprise and some believed that the new government of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham would not be able to unify the country.

The Trump administration believed al-Sharaa would succeed however, Israeli officials threatened al-Sharaa, called him a “terrorist in a suit” and some even threatened to target him. Israel embarked on a policy backing the Druze in Syria and some floated the idea of backing the Kurds and Alawites. Israel also seized areas near the border and grabbed the summit of Mount Hermon.

Syria’s new rulers believed they could find an agreement with Syria. Initial contacts didn’t turn into a deal though. Syria policy percolated on through several crises in 2025, until the Trump administration was able to bring together a trilateral meeting in January 2026. However, this hadn’t ended Israel-Syria tensions or Israel-Turkey tensions over Syria.

Barrack has been vocal following Israeli airstrikes in Syria

This month those tensions exploded into view with Israeli airstrikes in northern Syria. Barrack, who has been playing an important role in Syria for the last year is now front and center.

In the past he has preferred to work a bit more behind the scenes. He has praised energy deals in Syria. He has helped pave the way for the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces to integrate into the new government’s security forces. He has likely helped guide US policy on Iraq regarding disarming the Iranian-backed militias and supporting the new prime minister Ali al Zaidi. However, Barrack is careful not to make these incredibly complex policies too personal.

Dealing with Iraq and Syria is a thankless job. Both countries are going through transitions and both countries sit at the crossroads of the Levant. They have been a center of terrorist threats, the war on ISIS and competition between Iran, the US, Russia, Turkey and other countries. Even China is involved.

Other policy makers in Washington who played a role here, such as Brett McGurk and Ambassador James Jeffrey, saw how difficult this was. In addition, Joel Rayburn, the former special envoy for Syria, and Ambassador William Roebuck, who served as deputy special envoy for the Global Coalition Against ISIS, also saw this up close.

As such, Barrack came into his role following in the footsteps of others who had seen the gordian knot of US policy in Syria and Iraq up close. Dealing with the new minefield of Israel-Turkey tensions is a difficult task. In part this is because US policy on Israel tends to be separate from some other broader, regional policies.

Other US officials who played a key role in 2025 on Trump’s policy regarding Israel have already seen themselves critiqued in media. Steve Witkoff, who played a key role in bringing the hostages home and played a role in other US policies regarding Iran, Russia and other places, is one example.

What are media accounts saying about Barrack now?

“US working on deconfliction mechanism among Turkey, Israel and Syria, US envoy says,” Al-Monitor reported. “Is Tom Barrack’s job on the line because of Golan Heights comments?,” Israel Hayom asks.

“A US envoy clarifies his comments on Golan Heights that contradicted Trump’s position,” the Associated Press notes, while Turkiye Today says, “Trump envoy says Barrack’s Türkiye role part of ‘larger policy’ amid Israel tensions.”

At The Jerusalem Post we recently had an analysis that said “US envoy Tom Barrack’s Israel criticism tests his credibility as a mediator.” Israel’s Ynet went even further: “How US envoy Tom Barrack nearly ignited an Israel-Turkey war.”

After several days of a war of words regarding Barrack, there appears to be some climb down on the rhetoric. Ben Caspit writes at Al-Monitor that “Israel is rethinking its hard-line Syria policy and seeking to repair ties with US envoy and Donald Trump’s confidant Tom Barrack.” Ynet also reports that Azerbaijan is seeking to mediate Israel-Turkey tensions.

Baku is a close friend of both Ankara and Jerusalem. It doesn’t usually play a major role in Middle East issues, preferring to remain out of the spotlight and out of controversy. However, it wants to see Syria stable and has made this clear.

North Press in Syria has also reported on how Israel and Turkey are trying to reduce tensions.

Barrack’s role in US’s Syrian policy

Barrack has played a key role in US policy. Combining the Iraq and Syria roles under one person, in the form of the US Ambassador to Ankara, might seem like putting a lot of work in the hands of one person. However, concentrating policy in the hands of one kind of American proconsul may streamline policy. In the past the US has run into problems when its policy was not aligned.

Back in the days of the Obama administration the US played a janus-faced role in Syria. One part of the US government was backing Syrian rebel groups. This largely dovetailed with what Turkey, a NATO ally, wanted. Jordan, another US friend, also was happy to support the rebels alongside the US and other western powers. At the State Department and CIA this seemed like a logical choice.

However, the Pentagon was tasked in the fall of 2014 with fighting ISIS as part of Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve. US Central Command (CENTCOM) had to go out and find partners in Syria. They began working with the YPG, which helped form the basis for the SDF in 2015. In Ankara this was greeted by surprise. Ankara views the YPG as basically the Syrian version of the PKK, and thus a terrorist group. Turkey now wondered how its NATO ally was working with “terrorists” to fight ISIS.

Outside observers might think that the US could streamline this. Get the State Department, CENTCOM, CIA and others in the same room at the White House and figure out what to do on Syria. Instead the SDF crossed the Euphrates river to liberate Manbij from ISIS in 2016. Turkey then invaded Syria under Operation Euphrates Shield to basically put a stop to the SDF advance. For a moment it looked like US-backed forces might run into other US-backed forces. How this would help defeat ISIS or topple the Assad regime was unclear.

Thus, harnessing US policy on Syria in the hands of one person, rather than having everyone doing their own thing, is probably best. Having a diplomat who has the trust of Ankara and also Damascus and can speak clearly with the White House makes sense from a policy point of view. Whether this can reduce tensions with Israel and Turkey remains to be seen. 

This post was originally published on here. 

Innovation, Science, and Technology Minister Gila Gamliel filed a police complaint on Wednesday over the decision to conduct a recount of Likud primary ballots from Be’er Ya’akov. The complaint was filed against Likud Director General David Sharan, MK Haim Katz, and a security guard.

Katz responded in a post on his X account: “If anyone has complaints, here is the address: Ofek Park, Northern Industrial Zone, 1 Pesach Lev Street, Lod,” referring to the address of the Lahav 433 police unit headquarters.

The Likud announced on Tuesday that it would conduct a recount of the ballot boxes from Be’er Ya’akov after Gamliel appealed to the party’s Supreme Court. In her appeal, she requested an injunction preventing the opening of a ballot box in Be’er Ya’akov for a recount.

Gamliel argued that the recount could push her into the fourth tier of the Likud’s Knesset list, allowing Eti Atiya to replace her in the 25th position.

In her petition, Gamliel argued that the Likud Central Elections Committee’s decision to reopen ballot box No. 101101 in Be’er Ya’akov for a recount could directly and immediately harm her candidacy in the primaries. She asked the court to prevent the recount until it ruled on the petition itself.

Gamilel demands that if a recount is conducted, it must be carried out differently

Alternatively, she requested that if a recount is conducted, it be carried out in an equal and comprehensive manner across all ballot boxes nationwide where concerns over irregularities have been raised, rather than only in Be’er Ya’akov.

Gamliel claimed that “the count was contaminated.” The petition stated that the ballot boxes from Be’er Ya’akov remained in the possession of Likud management for eight days after they had already been counted and their results uploaded to the database, while the election results were already known and publicly available.

According to the petition, this period of custody “creates a real and serious concern regarding the integrity of the ballot boxes.”

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A former British regional police chief and three other officers are being investigated for misconduct over a decision to ban soccer fans of Israel’s Maccabi Tel Aviv from attending a game last year, the independent police watchdog said on Wednesday.

The West Midlands police force, which covers Birmingham in central England and is one of Britain’s biggest, had recommended that the Israeli fans should not be allowed to attend a Europa League match against Aston Villa last November because of security concerns.

The decision was condemned by both the British and Israeli governments, and Jewish community leaders accused the force of misrepresenting intelligence and undermining public confidence.

The game went ahead without Maccabi fans. There was no major disruption, although police made 11 arrests when pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli supporters demonstrated outside the stadium.

The chief constable of West Midlands Police Craig Guildford announced his immediate retirement in January after Britain’s interior minister said she no longer had confidence in him and a report found that his force had made a number of mistakes.

Independent Office for Police Conduct investigating Guildford for gross misconduct

On Wednesday, the Independent Office for Police Conduct said it was now investigating Guildford and a staff member for gross misconduct, and three other officers for lesser misconduct offenses.

“We have examined a wealth of material, hundreds of pieces of evidence, and believe there is an indication some people serving with the police may potentially have behaved in a manner that could justify disciplinary proceedings,” IOPC Director of Engagement Derrick Campbell said in a statement.

West Midlands Police said the initial ban was based on current intelligence and past incidents. But an independent inquiry found that it had overstated the threat from Israeli fans, relied on inaccurate intelligence, and missed opportunities to engage with the local Jewish community.

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The High Court of Justice heard arguments on Wednesday over the continued failure to complete the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation’s governing council, as KAN faces the prospect of being left without both a functioning council and a permanent chief executive.

The council currently has five serving members out of the 12 positions established by law, three of whom are serving under temporary court orders. At least seven members are required for it to convene and make decisions.

The lack of a quorum is expected to become particularly urgent when CEO Golan Yochpaz’s four-year term ends on November 6. The council is the statutory body authorized to extend his term, choose a replacement or appoint an acting chief executive. In its current composition, it cannot make any of those decisions.

Hatzlacha, the nonprofit organization behind the petitions, has asked the court to extend Yochpaz’s term temporarily until 60 days after the council returns to operation. The proposed arrangement would preserve management continuity while giving a restored council time to decide whether to retain Yochpaz or select someone else.

Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara and the five serving council members support the substance of the temporary proposal, while Yochpaz has said that he would be willing to remain in office during the interim period.

Opposition to temporarily extending Yochpaz’s  term 

Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi opposes a court-ordered extension. Through his privately retained lawyer, David Peter, he argued that the court does not have the authority to appoint KAN’s chief executive or extend the serving executive’s term.

Karhi has also asked the court to dismiss the remaining petitions, arguing that developments since they were filed have changed the circumstances on which they were based.

Wednesday’s hearing concerned four petitions remaining after a partial judgment issued on May 12. They challenge Karhi’s decisions not to extend the council terms of Michal Rafaeli-Kaduri, Menachem Ben-Sasson and Amir Sabhat, all of whom were recommended for additional terms by the independent search committee, and not to appoint a fourth recommended candidate, Aliza Dayan Hamama.

The appointment of an acting council chair also remains unresolved. The court previously instructed Karhi to act on that appointment promptly after deciding the four candidacies. Resolving the four candidacies together with the acting-chair appointment could restore the seven-member quorum required for the council to operate.

Search for new council members

A separate search is underway for six additional council members and has drawn 69 applications. According to an update submitted by the state, the initial examination and scoring process is expected to continue until at least the beginning of October.

Interviews, recommendations, examination by the relevant appointments review committee and final decisions by the minister would still be required afterward. The process is also taking place with an election period in the background, when senior public appointments are generally subject to additional legal restraint.

The dispute before Supreme Court President Isaac Amit and Justices Ofer Grosskopf and Gila Canfy-Steinitz centers on the limits of Karhi’s discretion over candidates recommended through the selection process established by law.

During the hearing, the justices questioned whether the minister was withholding individual appointments until he could secure a broader council composition acceptable to him. Grosskopf stressed that the minister’s authority is to approve or reject candidates recommended by the search committee – not to choose the council’s members himself.

Karhi’s position is that he is entitled to exercise judgment over the committee’s recommendations and seeks a council that reflects the public. The petitioners argue that he has exercised that discretion in a manner that has prevented the council from functioning.

In its May judgment, the High Court invalidated Karhi’s dismissal of retired judge Nechama Munitz as chairwoman of the search committee, finding that he had acted without legal authority. The court instructed the minister to advance the candidacies then before him promptly and directed the relevant officials to work toward filling all 12 council positions, including that of a permanent chair.

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The Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court acquitted Yona Simcha Schreiber on Wednesday over his attack on a Christian nun near King David’s Tomb on grounds of mental illness, ordered him to be hospitalized for up to six years.

Judge Ophir Tischler found that the evidence established that Schreiber did commit the acts described in the indictment, but he accepted the district psychiatrist’s conclusion that Schreiber was psychotic at the time and could neither understand the nature of his actions nor stop himself from carrying them out.

The ruling means that Shreiber cannot be held criminally responsible for the attack because of his mental condition at the time.

He had been charged with assault causing actual bodily harm motivated by hostility toward a religious group, as well as common assault. On April 28, he pushed a nun to the ground, then returned and kicked her, and finally assaulted a passerby who tried to intervene.

Acquitted by reason of insanity

The district psychiatrist diagnosed Schreiber with schizophrenia, finding that he had been psychotic for many years and lacked insight into his illness.

There was no conclusive evidence that specific psychotic thoughts directly caused the attack, the psychiatrist said. He nevertheless concluded that Schreiber’s illness directly influenced his actions and that, at the time, Schreiber could not understand what he was doing or refrain from doing it.

The psychiatrist recommended inpatient treatment, a position the prosecution ultimately accepted after requesting additional clarifications.

Under the court order, Schreiber’s hospitalization, dated from August 24, may continue for a maximum of six years, corresponding to the maximum penalty attached to the most serious offense in the case.

That period is a ceiling rather than a fixed sentence. A psychiatric committee may order his earlier release if it concludes that his medical condition permits. The committee has been instructed to notify both the prosecution and the defense of any such decision.

The court reached its final decision after several hearings over the psychiatric findings and the rights of the woman who was attacked.

At an August 16 hearing, the prosecution raised questions about the psychiatric opinion, prompting the court to ask the district psychiatrist for clarification. In a response filed the following day, the psychiatrist said he was convinced that Schreiber suffered from schizophrenia, had experienced psychosis for years, and was unable to understand or control his actions during the attack.

The prosecution initially agreed that the case should end with an acquittal and a hospitalization order. It then sought a short delay after an attorney representing the nun arrived at an August 24 hearing and said she had not been properly informed of the psychiatric findings.

Harassment and attacks against Christians in Jerusalem

The nun’s attorney, Zaki Sahlia, questioned the assessment and argued that the fact that Schreiber targeted the nun rather than other people nearby raised doubts about whether the attack resulted from his illness. He also placed the case in the context of recurring harassment and attacks against Christian clergy in Jerusalem.

Tischler rejected the argument that the law required a further delay before the court could act on the psychiatric opinion. The law provides victims with an opportunity to state their position before a plea bargain or another negotiated arrangement closes a case, he wrote, but this was not such an agreement.

The opinion came from the state’s own district psychiatrist and left the court required to address Schreiber’s continued detention, the judge added. He ordered that Schreiber be held in hospital conditions while the prosecution completed its consultations.

At Wednesday’s final hearing, the prosecution said it had fulfilled its obligations toward the nun, heard her position, and remained in favor of accepting the psychiatric opinion. The prosecution and defense then jointly asked the court to acquit Schreiber.

The nun’s attorney said she remained uncomfortable with the psychiatric findings but respected the court’s decision.

Schreiber’s public defender, Idan Gamlieli, said the district psychiatrist had determined that the “regrettable incident” resulted from Schreiber’s illness and that he required inpatient psychiatric treatment.

“We hope the medical treatment will help him return to optimal functioning,” Gamlieli said. “It is important to note that we understand the complainant’s difficult feelings and wish her recovery from the consequences of this regrettable incident.”

Nun’s attack caught on video

The attack occurred at approximately 5:42 p.m. near King David’s Tomb in Jerusalem.

Schreiber, a resident of the West Bank settlement of Peduel, saw the nun wearing clothing that identified her as Christian, ran toward her, and pushed her forcefully to the ground.

She struck her head and became dizzy. Schreiber initially walked away but returned several seconds later and kicked her while she was still on the ground. When a passerby intervened, Schreiber attacked him with punches and kicks.

The nun suffered bruising to her face and leg. The assault, which was captured on video, prompted widespread condemnation from Christian representatives, academics, and Israeli officials.

Sahlia told The Jerusalem Post that an appeal was not likely, but that he was “still studying the decision” and that there were other avenues to pursue.

This post was originally published on here.