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Libya‘s National Oil Corporation (NOC) said a drone attacked the Zawiya oil refinery complex, the country’s largest operating refinery, on Tuesday, the fifth attack since Saturday.

The NOC said a diesel storage tank belonging to the Zawiya Oil Refining Company was hit, causing a small fire that has since been contained.

With a capacity of 120,000 barrels per day, Zawiya is the largest operational refinery in the country.

Examples of recent drone attacks against Zawiya refinery

On Monday, a fire, accompanied by heavy smoke, broke out in a diesel tank oil depot at the refinery after the tank was struck, according to the Brega Petroleum Marketing Company.

Early Tuesday morning, Libya’s National Oil Corporation confirmed the facility had been struck by a drone, noting that the attack caused no casualties or damage.

Soon after, the refinery was again targeted by a drone, Saudi state-owned Al Arabiya reported.

Jerusalem Post Staff contributed to this report.

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The Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court ordered the immediate release of settler Tal Yinon Dardik on Tuesday, finding insufficient grounds to keep him detained over charges that he violated an earlier military restriction order.

Judge Amir Shaked released Dardik without imposing additional conditions through the criminal proceeding. He stressed, however, that Dardik remains subject to a separate military order issued on Monday that bars him from nearly all of the West Bank and requires him to report regularly to police.

The ruling therefore ends Dardik’s detention but does not allow him to return freely to the West Bank or invalidate the security establishment’s assessment that restrictions against him are warranted.

Dardik is suspected of involvement in attacks against Palestinians and other nationalist-motivated offenses, including a March raid in which a Palestinian man was allegedly subjected to severe physical and sexual abuse. Dardik denies involvement, and he has not been charged over those allegations.

Security authorities said intelligence connected him to illegal and violent activity that endangered lives and property. A military appeals committee and the Jerusalem District Court subsequently found that the intelligence justified substantial restrictions and that the original decision to issue an administrative order against him was reasonable and proportionate.

Charged with six counts of violating a lawful order

The criminal case that led to his detention is narrower: Dardik was charged with six counts of violating a lawful order and one count of obstructing a police officer after authorities said he failed to remain at his mother-in-law’s home in the Adei Ad settlement, as required by an order signed by Central Command chief Maj.-Gen. Avi Bluth on June 9.

His mother-in-law, however, had not agreed to house him.

A military appeals committee ruled that Bluth could not compel a third party to accommodate Dardik against her wishes and canceled that part of the order. The Jerusalem District Court upheld the committee’s decision on Sunday, while leaving intact its finding that Dardik posed a real danger to security in the area.

Bluth subsequently revised the order, replacing the house-arrest requirement with a ban from the West Bank, except for Modi’in Illit. Dardik must report to a police station there twice a day. The military said the revised order will expire on the same date as the original and is an amendment rather than a new order.

Police prosecutors agreed that Dardik should be released but asked the Magistrate’s Court to make his release conditional on compliance with the revised military restrictions.

Shaked rejected that request, ruling that the new order could not supply grounds for detention in a criminal case concerning alleged violations of the previous one.

The cancellation of the requirement that Dardik stay at his mother-in-law’s home had significantly weakened the evidence supporting the charges against him, Shaked said. He found no sufficient evidentiary basis to keep Dardik detained until the conclusion of the proceedings.

The judge also criticized prosecutors for attempting to combine the criminal case with the separate administrative process. A court could not keep Dardik behind bars to prevent a possible future violation of an order issued only while he was already detained, he ruled.

Shaked denied the prosecution’s request to delay Dardik’s release to allow time for an appeal, saying such a delay would effectively prolong his detention despite the state itself having requested his release.

Dardik told the court that the revised order had been read to him and that he was aware of its terms.

Honenu, the legal aid organization representing him, said Dardik had conducted a 38-day hunger strike during his detention. That figure and the details of the strike were supplied by the organization.

Honenu described the ruling as a victory and called for the cancellation of administrative detention orders against other Jewish settlers.

“We are pleased that the defense’s arguments from the outset were accepted,” attorney Nati Rom said. “There was no violation and no justification for his detention.”

Attorney Moshe Polsky accused the state of dragging Dardik through unnecessary proceedings, while Honenu called the use of administrative detention against settlers a “black flag” and urged Bluth to cancel them.

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On Monday, the IDF made an unusual decision regarding the settler and allegedly dangerous activist, Tal Yinon Dardik, which might be a model for reducing administrative detention for some Palestinians.

Since October 7, the number of Palestinians in administrative detention has tripled and quadrupled.

Previously, it had been on a spectrum between hundreds and around 1,000, and for the last three years, between 3,000 and over 3,300.

Along with other issues, this has severely harmed Israeli legitimacy worldwide.

Immediately after October 7, and arguably until the defeat of the last of Hamas’s 24 battalions in summer 2024 – or even until the ceasefire with Hamas in October 2025 – one could justify Israel taking a hit in the legitimacy department in order to ensure its fundamental future security needs versus Hamas.

However, since somewhere between summer 2024 and October 2025, Israel has been reevaluating various more extreme wartime practices.

For example, currently (though tactics can change at any moment), the IDF is in a ceasefire on all fronts and is not actively attacking any of its adversaries.

If the IDF and Israel can afford such a risk to try to advance some of its legitimacy and diplomatic long-term interests, might there be room to reduce the off-the-charts volume of administrative detentions of Palestinians?

Dardik model may help achieve this goal

The next challenge would be: Under what model could this be done?

This is where Dardik could come into the picture.

Israel’s defense establishment suspects Dardik was involved in multiple violent and dangerous attacks on Palestinian villages, including in March.

Despite viewing Dardik as an ongoing and potential future danger – beyond even his past alleged dangerous conduct – a series of court decisions and debates within the Israeli defense establishment have led to more lenient terms for Dardik than his prison stints and even than previous administrative travel restraining orders.

For example, at one earlier point, Dardik was prohibited by an IDF administrative restraining order from traveling anywhere in the West Bank.

While he still cannot travel to most of the West Bank, it is now permitted for him to travel to and live in Modi’in Illit, which is in Judea and Samaria.

Essentially, with Dardik, a mix of the courts and the Israeli defense establishment decided that he was and remains dangerous, but that if he does not go anywhere in the West Bank other than Modi’in Illit and if he checks in with the police of that town twice a day, the danger he presents can be counterbalanced or tolerated.

Electronic ankle cuffs could allow for travel throughout West Bank

In addition, the IDF went further, suggesting that if Dardik was willing to wear electronic ankle cuffs that allow him to be tracked, it could even consider allowing him to travel in other parts of the West Bank.

In the past, a small number of extremist, violent Jews were sometimes put in administrative detention. But that has not happened since Defense Minister Israel Katz vetoed it in January 2025.

All that has been left – short of full criminal indictments – are administrative restraining orders related to traveling to the West Bank.

It would appear that the Israeli defense establishment thinks it can strike creative and lenient balancing acts short of house arrest, not just merely with Jews who are affiliated with an ideologically violent group, but even with Jews like Dardik, who are suspected of repeated actual violence.

If so, could this model be used for Palestinians who are merely affiliated with terror groups, such as passing out recruiting fliers, but have not been part of a plot to perpetrate violence?

Until now, the answers about why Palestinians get treated more harshly, often regarding administrative detention and similar tools, than Jews have been twofold.

First, ideologically speaking, more of the Palestinian detainees are looking to commit murders, and more of the Jewish detainees are looking to commit vandalism or lower-grade violence.

Second, it was considered too dangerous to leave Palestinians under house arrest or under an administrative restraining order against certain travel in the West Bank because they do not live surrounded by Israeli police.

Further, if a Palestinian decided to disappear and break the conditions of his or her release from detention, it would be much harder to locate and rearrest them, requiring a large IDF incursion into Palestinian areas.

There was also an assumption that Jewish detainees were not all that dangerous, and so they could be released as long as they did not perpetrate witness tampering.

But now, possibly all of these differences have fallen away, paving a path toward more leniency for Palestinians instead of administrative detention, and toward winning back some of Israel’s legitimacy globally – especially in the United States.

Dardik has been declared dangerous in both the past and the future, but officials deemed an administrative restraining order regarding travel or ankle cuffs sufficient to balance the danger.

Even more significant, the idea that invading Palestinian areas to rearrest a Palestinian detainee who broke the conditions of his release was a big deal comes from a pre-2022-2023 time period when such raids were rare.

Since 2022, and even more since October 7, nightly IDF raids into all parts of the West Bank have become standard. Leaving large IDF outposts in the center of Jenin, Tulkarm, Nur Shams, and other places has also become standard since January 2025.

So what exactly is so hard and unusual about another raid or two to rearrest such a Palestinian? Knowing how complete the IDF’s control over Judea and Samaria is today, as opposed to a few years ago, could also deter an only mildly committed associate of a terror group from trying to flee and hide.

The Dardik model could be rolled out as a pilot program for a small number of Palestinian detainees and tracked for outcomes before it is expanded much.

Besides starting to try to improve the already bad legitimacy situation, rolling out such a pilot program would save Israel from otherwise undermining its entire basis for administrative detention of Palestinians.

One of the critical bases and defenses has always been that detainees are usually held for periods of six months to two years.

But with a rising number of thousands of detainees (How can each one be an arch terrorist leader?) being held for longer than that, there is a point where Israel would be eroding its own defense of the administrative detention tool under international law.

None of this suggests Israel should be releasing hardened violent terrorists.

But it has been clear for some time that when Israel has over 3,000 Palestinians in administrative detention on top of twice as many other Palestinians in other detention situations, not all of the 3,000-plus detainees can be as bad as Israel has claimed the kind of person who gets administratively detained needs to be.

Palestinian terror is nowhere near disappearing and must be fought in a variety of ways, likely still involving administrative detention at times.

Yet getting the volume of Palestinian administrative detainees under control is a time bomb for American and global support that Jerusalem likely needs to defuse so that Israel can save its global standing while there is still time.

This post was originally published on here. 

Israel and Venezuela agreed to renew consular relations and establish an official coordination channel after 17 years without diplomatic ties, the countries said in a joint announcement on Tuesday.

The move creates an official coordination channel between Israel and Venezuela, which have not maintained diplomatic relations since 2009.

The agreement followed talks held in recent weeks between Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar and Venezuelan Foreign Minister Félix Plasencia.

During the talks, the two sides agreed to establish a coordination mechanism that will enable consular services to be provided to citizens of both countries. 

The statement also emphasized the importance of ties between the State of Israel and Venezuela’s Jewish community, which the community celebrated. 

“After 17 years without consular relations, Venezuela and Israel are advancing in a confidence-building process that began with the various Israeli and Jewish organizations that came to Venezuela on the occasion of the double earthquake that struck the country on June 24, and which on that occasion provided great technical and humanitarian aid in the face of the tragedy and devastation,” National Coordinator of the Confederation of Jewish Associations of Venezuela, Dr. Miguel Truzman wrote in a statement. 

“Today, a new era begins, taking a first step in the Consular area, as technical support in the areas required, and in the near future, diplomatic relations between both nations will be fully restored.” 

Jewish residents of Venezuela said that they were excited for a return to normal relations between the two countries. 

“This is news that fills us with hope and joy and marks a significant step toward rapprochement and a return to normalcy for many people who have waited years for practical solutions,” A., a Jewish resident of Caracas, told Walla.

He added that “the renewal of the consular coordination mechanism between Venezuela and Israel is not merely a diplomatic matter.

“First and foremost, it provides much-needed relief for families and citizens by facilitating procedures and administrative matters, and by building a bridge of understanding and human assistance where there had previously been distance,” he added.

“I warmly welcome this rapprochement, which offers an opportunity to renew ties, resolve everyday issues, and look to the future with a renewed commitment to cooperation and mutual respect,” he said. “Bravo to Minister Félix Ramón Plasencia González, and bravo to AIV Chief Rabbi Isaac Cohen.”

Israel and Venezuela agree to continue coordination after massive earthquake

Additionally, following the earthquake and the humanitarian crisis in Venezuela, the pair also agreed to continue cooperating on emergency response and recovery efforts. An Israeli delegation was deployed there in June and has since helped tens of thousands of Venezuelans return to their homes.

The Venezuelan government’s receipt of Israeli assistance contrasts with the complete cut-off in relations between the countries dating back to 2009.

In the aftermath, officials estimated that at least 5,000 people died.

Yonah Jeremy Bob contributed to this report. 

This post was originally published on here. 

Two rabbis who attended New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s hour-long, closed-door roundtable at City Hall on Monday said they left feeling “hopeful” and that the mayor attended in “good faith.”

The meeting – convened by the Mayor’s Office to Combat Antisemitism – featured 10 rabbis from various Jewish denominations. The Jerusalem Post reached out to several rabbis who participated, including Rabbi Jonathan Leener, leader of the Prospect Heights Shul, a liberal Modern Orthodox synagogue in Brooklyn, and Rabbi “S,” who did not wish to be named.

“I chose to participate in the roundtable given the opportunity to represent my community’s views directly to the mayor,” Rabbi S told the Post. “One of the organizers assured us that we would all have a chance to speak, so the opportunity to really be there on behalf of my community was a meaningful one, and I felt that the outreach was made in good faith with an openness to listen, so it felt worth going to express our points of view and raise our concerns.”

Rabbi Leener had a similar incentive: “As a rabbi, I see my role as an advocate for the safety and well-being of the Jewish people, especially my fellow New Yorkers.”

Leener said he has profound disagreements with Mamdani, particularly around Israel, and that some of the mayor’s rhetoric has contributed to “turning up the temperature at a moment when many Jewish New Yorkers already feel increasingly vulnerable.”

“That is precisely why I felt it was important to show up and say those things directly to him,” he said. “The meeting was also an opportunity to move beyond public statements and talk concretely about what the city government can do to address antisemitism and help Jewish New Yorkers feel safer.”

Roundtable focused on Mamdani’s contributions to rising NYC antisemitism

The predominant focus of the roundtable, from what both rabbis conveyed to the Post, was the rising antisemitism in NYC and the way in which the mayor’s hostility toward Israel has contributed to it.

“The message that was sent by everybody, each in their own way, to the mayor was that while we may agree or disagree with the current actions of the Israeli government or the current war, that the mayor’s harsh rhetoric around Israel and its government and the mayor’s continual singling out and excessive focus on Israel – when there are so many other things going on in our city and beyond – was alienating to our constituents, makes Jewish New Yorkers feel that the mayor is not for them, and makes them feel unsafe,” Rabbi S recalled.

“We reiterated that it is hard to feel a sense of partnership when it feels like Israel is being singled out for harsh rhetoric attacks and the mayor is doing nothing to distinguish between Israel and New York City’s Jews,” he added.

He said each rabbi tried to express this same point to the mayor “in the hopes of him taking that to heart” and upholding his pledge to be a mayor for all New Yorkers and help them feel safe.

Leener told the Post that while there were “certainly moments of tension and passion,” these were “expressed respectfully.”

“No one was there trying to convince the mayor to change his views on Israel,” he said. “Rather, people were trying to convey how isolated and vulnerable many Jewish New Yorkers feel and the extent to which some believe [Mamdani’s] rhetoric and the singling out of Israel have contributed to that feeling.”

Like Rabbi S, Leener said concerns were raised several times about Mamdani’s perceived “double standard” when it comes to Israel, and that “Israel and the Jewish community’s relationship to Israel are sometimes treated in ways that other communities and their connections to countries or homelands are not.”

Outside of Mamdani’s own contribution to rising antisemitism, both rabbis told the Post that there was broad consensus that Jew-hatred is making the city unsafe.

“There seemed to be broad agreement about the seriousness of the security concerns facing Jewish institutions and the need for the city government to respond to them,” Leener said.

“There was also a shared desire for the administration to better understand what Jewish New Yorkers are experiencing right now. The vulnerability and anxiety within the community were very real themes throughout the conversation.”

NYC rabbis: Roundtable properly represented New York Jewish community

Despite past criticisms of Mamdani for choosing to associate with select sects of Judaism – especially left-wing, progressive, and anti-Zionist ones – both rabbis told the Post that “there was tremendous diversity around the table.”

“I really do think it was a good representation of New York’s Jewish community,” Rabbi S said. “It’s impossible to get all segments, but the major denominations were there, and there was representation from a fair amount, geographically, of New York City.”

Leener concurred: “I thought there was a thoughtful range of voices in the room.”

“Obviously, no small group of rabbis can fully represent the extraordinary diversity of New York’s Jewish community,” he continued. “But people came from different communities, institutions, and points of view, and I thought that contributed to a substantive conversation.”

Leener said that part of the power of the meeting was its intimacy, as a smaller group created space for a more candid and meaningful exchange. He also said that, from his understanding, there are to be additional conversations in the future.

Both rabbis said they came away with the impression that the mayor was there to listen and was open to suggestions.

“He was respectful in his responses and frequently asked clarifying questions to better understand what people were saying,” Leener said. “I felt that he was genuinely engaging with us, acting in good faith, and listening carefully to our concerns, particularly our plea to help turn down the temperature.

“I know some will view that as simply part of his political skill or personal charm, and I understand that skepticism. But my honest read of both him and the room was that the engagement felt genuine.”

Rabbi S spoke similarly of Mamdani’s approach: “The mayor listened, asked some clarifying questions, and expressed that he appreciated the good faith conversation and that he took our words to heart.

While Rabbi S said he truly does not know what to expect going forward, he nevertheless felt grateful to be in the room.

“I think there was really strong consensus about that, despite people’s different views about Israel, and there was also a consensus that there’s a desire to work with the mayor on other issues of concern like affordability, childcare, and healthcare. A number of people raised immigration, and the mayor acknowledged these as issues of common cause and concern,” he said.

Leener told the Post he left feeling “cautiously hopeful.”

“I appreciated that the administration invited us in, listened, and created space for a candid and substantive conversation. But ultimately, I will judge the mayor and his administration by their actions and by the results they deliver,” he said.

For Leener, one concrete test will be whether the Jewish community sees meaningful progress around security, including making NYPD presence more accessible to synagogues, Jewish schools, and other Jewish institutions.

“I hope the conversation leads to greater understanding, a lowering of the temperature, and ultimately concrete action,” he said.

“What stayed with me most was the value of being in actual conversation. Our political climate has made it increasingly difficult to speak openly with people with whom we profoundly disagree, as though simply sitting down, listening, or engaging somehow means abandoning our convictions. I believe the opposite is true,” Leener continued.

“I remain a staunch supporter of Israel and have profound disagreements with the mayor that were not resolved by this meeting. But we can hold deeply to our beliefs while remaining in real conversation with one another. In fact, that is often how greater understanding becomes possible.”

This post was originally published on here. 

Israeli security forces arrested 27 suspects in simultaneous raids on dozens of homes in Ashdod and Kiryat Gat on Tuesday morning, in the culmination of a months-long undercover operation infiltrating criminal networks in the two cities. 

According to police, the suspects took control of delivery and distribution routes in Ashdod and Kiryat Gat and coerced business owners into using their services, aiming the establish control over their areas of operation, generate profits, and launder funds.

The operation, dubbed Operation Courier Run, was jointly carried out by the Southern District Israel Police, Border Police, and the Lachish District Central Investigations Unit (YAMAR). 

Border Police arrest Beersheba resident who hid eleven Palestinians behind a pile of tires in his vehicle

Early on Tuesday morning, Jerusalem area Border Police arrested a Beersheba resident in his 60s who is suspected of transporting 11 Palestinian residents of the West Bank into sovereign Israel, who themselves were also arrested. 

Israeli security officers at the Ofer border crossing searched a vehicle which seemed “suspicious,” per the police report, and discovered a large pile of used tires in the back. Upon moving the tires, they found a double wall, behind which the 11 Palestinians were hiding. 

Tel Aviv police arrest 26-year-old suspected of massive credit card fraud scheme

Police in north Tel Aviv arrested a 26-year-old suspect on Monday who is suspected of making hundreds of thousands of shekels in purchases using fraudulently obtained credit cards. News of the arrest was disclosed to the public on Tuesday, along with the extension of the suspect’s detention. 

This arrest followed a months-long undercover operation in which investigators amassed information about the suspect’s purchases, which included computers, luxury clothing, sunglasses, and shoes sold in stores throughout the Tel Aviv area.  

Courts issue restriction order against crime boss Yossi Musli

Tel Aviv police on Tuesday successfully petitioned the courts to issue a judicial restriction order against Yossi Musli, the head of the Musli crime family. Per the order, Musli is on house arrest, prohibited from contacting a number of other known criminals, and banned from using the internet.

Musli was arrested in July in connection with a series of grenade attacks, arson, and shootings in central and northern Israel, which have been ongoing throughout the summer. The investigation into the attacks remains ongoing, with several additional arrests made nationwide in connection with the incidents.

Stun grenade attack foiled in Bat Yam, suspect arrested

Also on Tuesday, police responded to a call in Bat Yam reporting that a person was seen in public holding a grenade and allegedly intending to throw it. 

Police were able to arrest the suspect, a 22-year-old resident of central Israel, before he could use the grenade, which turned out to be a stun grenade. Security forces then neutralized the grenade. 

This post was originally published on here. 

British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband pressed Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar over humanitarian aid to Gaza and violence in the West Bank during their first phone call on Tuesday, while the two also discussed Hamas’s disarmament, Iran and antisemitism, according to a statement issued by Miliband.

Miliband described the conversation with Sa’ar as a “frank and constructive first call,” saying the British government remained committed to open dialogue and a two-state solution that would include “a safe and secure State of Israel and Palestinian State.”

The foreign secretary said he raised what he described as a “sharp escalation of settler violence and settlement expansion,” as well as the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip.

Today I had a frank and constructive first call with Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/48pIdbvwXt

— Ed Miliband (@Ed_Miliband) August 11, 2026

“I said Israel must crack down on violence in the West Bank, and must immediately end blockages on aid into Gaza,” Miliband said.

The discussion comes as the West Bank and the future of a two-state solution remain points of disagreement between Israel and Britain. Earlier this year, Sa’ar clashed with then-British foreign secretary Yvette Cooper at the UN Security Council after she criticized Israeli policies in the West Bank.

Hamas disarmament, Iran and antisemitism

Miliband also called for Hamas to give up its weapons and for the IDF to withdraw, saying progress was needed on US President Donald Trump’s 20-point plan.

Additionally, the two discussed shared security challenges and agreed on the need to combat antisemitism worldwide and the “vital shared interest in ensuring that we never see a nuclear Iran.”

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Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) co-chair Megan Romer said in an interview last Friday with The New Yorker editor David Remnick that she “probably would have” attended the October 8, 2023, pro-Palestine rally in New York City and said the events of October 7 had been “largely inevitable.”

During the interview, the discussion turned toward the October 7 massacre and the subsequent demonstrations showing solidarity with the Hamas-led attack in New York.

Remnick asked Romer whether she would have participated in the protest held in Times Square, noting that it took place just one day after the attacks, and asked her directly: “One day after the slaughter of 1,200 people and the taking of over 200 hostages, you would have come and rallied behind Hamas?” Romer responded by saying that she “probably would have” attended the demonstration.

Romer defended her perspective by adding, “I think that October 7 was largely inevitable. If you put people in an open-air concentration camp and you deprive them of rights, of dignity, of food, of the ability to live in safety, you have to expect that they are going to not take that for that long. And that is not defending any harm of civilians or of non-combatants.”

When Remnick pushed back by noting, “Well, sure it is, you said you’re supporting it,” Romer replied, “I’m saying that I think it was inevitable. I think that you cannot put people in a cage and expect them not to revolt.”

In another portion of the interview, the conversation shifted to the status of human rights and regional dynamics. Addressing the status of LGBTQ+ rights in the region, Romer said she “would not call Hamas queer-friendly,” but also added that she “would not say that you can get a lot of social rights when you’re under siege.”

When questioned about historical diplomatic efforts, specifically regarding the 2000 Camp David proposal that sought to establish a Palestinian state alongside Israel, Romer stated she did not know the specifics of the proposal.

Romer: US defense, economic support for Israel a ‘solid red line’ for DSA

Expanding on the broader platform and policies of the DSA, Romer also addressed the organization’s geopolitical stance. She said that any US defense or economic support for Israel represents a “solid red line” for the DSA.

Furthermore, she noted that the group supports “a free Palestine with the capital in Jerusalem,” acknowledging that the stance could “be safely read as a one-state solution.”

The interview drew scrutiny and criticism from the Anti-Defamation League, which published a detailed response addressing Romer’s remarks on X/Twitter.

Opening its statement, the ADL said that it was a “jaw-dropping interview” that “should concern every American because this kind of hateful and demonizing rhetoric against the only Jewish state in the world goes well beyond criticism of a government or its policies, and it puts every Jewish American at risk. We’ve seen this far too often.”

The organization emphasized that Romer’s refusal to denounce Hamas meant shielding a US-designated foreign terrorist organization responsible for the deadliest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, whose charter explicitly calls for the destruction of Israel, noting that she had previously urged followers to “read on,” to learn “why we do not, in fact, condemn Hamas.”

Continuing its breakdown of the interview, the ADL added, “She also called the Hamas-led October 7 massacre a mere ‘revolt’ and ‘largely inevitable.’ There is no justification for rape, kidnapping, torture, and slaughter.”

Addressing Romer’s remarks on LGBT rights and regional policy, the ADL pushed back against her attempt to contextualize the terror group’s record, stating: “Let’s be very clear: Hamas does not persecute LGBTQ+ people because of a conflict. It does so because persecution of LGBTQ+ people is a core part of its ideology, whether it fits the DSA and Romer’s narrative or not.”

ADL: Romer ‘does not know the basic diplomatic history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict’

Regarding Romer’s stance on a one-state solution, the ADL criticized her unfamiliarity with historical efforts, writing: “The co-chair of an organization constantly calling for a ‘free Palestine’ and who claims Palestinian people are ‘in a cage,’ does not know the basic diplomatic history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and yet, she thinks she’s a legitimate commentator.”

The organization also argued that the DSA’s vision for a single-state outcome leaves no room for Jews’ self-determination in their ancestral homeland.

Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the ADL, concluded the response by writing on X, “When people and groups tell you who they are, believe them.”

The ADL noted that the DSA, which has over 120,000 members and more than 250 elected officials across the United States, is no longer on the fringes of society and possesses the ability to influence mainstream political discourse and policy.

This post was originally published on here. 

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has ruled out entering talks with Restore leader Rupert Lowe unless the latter removes his “antisemitic” co-founder from the party.

Reform and Restore compete for a similar voter base on the British right, though relations between their leadership are strained.

On Monday, Farage held a press conference in which he addressed recent rumors that Reform and Restore might make a deal.

“So we can talk to Rupert Lowe – that’s fine,” he said. “But when you have co-founders, et cetera, putting out what I would call the ‘old theory’ – the old theory that we probably haven’t heard in this country since 1936 – and you have other adjacent publicly supportive people demanding that all Jews be removed from the country, just as an example…”

“The condition I would put on it is that those people would have to be out of the inner circle, and I think that for me would be the only way we could sensibly proceed,” he continued.

The co-founder in question is Charlie Downes. He was accused earlier in the month of insinuating that Farage had been “bought” out by Jewish supporters. Specifically, Downes responded to one of Farage’s posts on X/Twitter, in which Farage said he could not be bought, with an image showing him in front of signs for the Reform Jewish Alliance.

According to Politico, Farage’s attack on “publicly supportive people demanding that all Jews be removed from the country” is a reference to Steve Laws, a backer of Restore Britain who is an advocate of “total remigration.”

Reform spokesman: No agreement with Lowe’s party while Downes in place

A spokesman for Reform told The Telegraph that there was no question of any agreement with Lowe’s party while Downes was in place.

“There are antisemitic and extreme racists at or near the top of the party, and they would have to go first,” he said.

“We’re happy to talk, but we can’t do it when there are people in the party like Charlie Downes. This all started with the Groypers in the US, and it’s happening here, putting out this anti-Jewish stuff that is very similar to the far Left.”

A groyper is a member of a far-right, white nationalist network of internet users and activists, led by Nick Fuentes.

Reform behind Conservatives, at lowest polling score since March 2025

Reform is at its lowest polling score since March 2025, with the party losing ground to the Conservatives.

The latest YouGov survey put Labour on 24 points, two points ahead of Nigel Farage’s party on 22% – the first time a YouGov poll has put Labour ahead of Reform in more than a year. Restore currently has 4 points, according to the same poll.

When approached for comment, Reform pointed The Jerusalem Post to Farage’s comments to Politico.

This post was originally published on here. 

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised high-tech entrepreneur Oren Dobronsky, who holds the first reserved slot in Likud, that he would be appointed as the minister responsible for artificial intelligence (AI) if Netanyahu forms the next government, Walla learned on Tuesday.

This decision aligns with Netanyahu’s strategy to highlight artificial intelligence (AI) as a central theme in the upcoming election campaign.

In addition to addressing diplomatic, security, and economic matters, Netanyahu aims to showcase AI as a significant driver of economic growth and an area where Israel needs to compete with leading countries around the world.

The prime minister has emphasized the importance of advancing AI and reinforcing Israel’s standing in the global technology race.

Netanyahu’s interest in the field is not new. In June 2023, after speaking with Elon Musk and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Netanyahu declared, “We will turn Israel into a global artificial intelligence power.”

The dawn of a new AI era

During his conversation with Musk, Netanyahu said humanity was at “the dawn of a new era,” the era of AI. He stressed that the changes were taking place rapidly and that Israel needed to formulate a national policy on the issue.

Likud announced on Monday that Dobronsky would receive the party’s first reserved spot on its slate ahead of the Knesset election. Dobronsky is an entrepreneur and businessman who was among the founders of high-tech company Hotbar and spent years working in Silicon Valley.

In a statement, Likud said Dobronsky, whom the party describes as right-wing, would be part of the “Likud team.” The party said that after the election, he is expected to lead efforts involving artificial intelligence in the economy, education, medicine, finance, and other sectors.

Dobronsky attacks Trump on X

Shortly after his reserved spot on the slate was announced, it emerged that about two months earlier, Dobronsky had attacked US President Donald Trump in a post on X, calling him “a morally corrupt person.”

“Put aside for a moment the question of whether the agreement with Iran is good or bad,” the businessman wrote. “In what world is it normal not to invite to the negotiating table the ally that fought shoulder to shoulder with you?”

He added, “Trump not only did not invite Israel to the negotiating table, but he did not even share the text of the agreement itself with it? What kind of morally corrupt person treats an ally like that?”

Later that evening, following the media uproar, Dobronsky issued an apology to the US president.

“President Trump is the greatest friend Israel has ever had in the White House. I have posted in his favor countless times. On one occasion, without knowing all the facts, I lost my temper and posted something I regret. I apologize to President Trump, whom I admire from the bottom of my heart.”

This post was originally published on here. 

Former Israeli ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan announced on Tuesday that the new right-wing party he heads will be called the Unity Party, unveiling the name during an event in Beit Shemesh marking MK Aliza Bloch’s joining the party.

The party’s slogan will be “Real right. Real enlistment.”

This is a developing story.

This post was originally published on here. 

Ben-Gurion Airport officials identified an unauthorized civilian drone approaching the airport on Tuesday morning, according to the Israel Airports Authority.

Shortly before noon, a Ben-Gurion Airport control room employee detected a drone in their airspace and activated security protocols. Airport police were tasked with locating the drone’s operator. 

Within less than an hour of the initial identification of the drone, the operator was found and interrogated. The drone was being used to film promotional video clips for a construction company. 

Ben-Gurion Airport operations disrupted by civilian drone intrusion, takeoffs and landings halted

A similar event occured on August 5, when Israel’s N12 News reported that flights at Ben-Gurion Airport were disrupted after a civilian drone entered its airspace.

Takeoffs and landings were halted during the incident, according to the report, which occured during peak hours.

 
Transportation Ministry Director-General Moshe Ben Zaken began an investigation following the incident, N12 added.

The incident followed a July 23 N12 report regarding a potential complete civilian drone ban in all of Israel’s airspace.

The consideration of a total ban is due to the lack of effective counter-drone technologies in the country, N12 reported, with concerns that an Iranian or Hezbollah attack would involve an increased use of drones.

This post was originally published on here. 

Beth Jacob, a synagogue in Montpelier, Vermont, joined forces with the Unitarian Universalist Church of Montpelier on Sunday to co-host a fundraising event supporting Mohsen Mahdawi, a Columbia University student and pro-Palestinian activist facing ongoing deportation proceedings. 

According to the event listing published on the synagogue’s website, the gathering at the Unitarian Universalist Church featured Mahdawi speaking on updates regarding his legal case, alongside guest speakers including constitutional lawyer and civil rights scholar David Cole, Harvard Divinity School Jewish studies professor Shaul Magid, NOFA Vermont executive director Grace Oedel, Vermont-NEA member benefits director Mark Hage, Middlebury College visiting professor Eric Levi Jacobson, and Unitarian Universalist Church minister Rev. Joan Javier-Duval.

Proceeds from the gathering were designated directly for Mahdawi’s legal defense fund. 

The event, however, drew criticism within the community. Investigative journalists Rachel Feldman, based in Vermont, and David Collier, based in the United Kingdom, previously published extensive findings in April 2025 and again in August 2026 detailing Mahdawi’s background, raising serious concerns regarding the decision of a Jewish institution to lend its platform and credibility to his defense. 

Mahdawi’s legal battles began in April 2025, when US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents detained him at a US Citizenship and Immigration Services office in Colchester, Vermont, while he was attending a pre-scheduled appointment for his naturalization test.

Rather than facing criminal charges, Mahdawi was targeted under a rarely used provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. Section 1227(a)(4)(C)(i)), which allows the Secretary of State to initiate removal proceedings against a noncitizen whose presence or activities are determined to carry potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences.

Then-secretary of state Marco Rubio invoked this provision, citing Mahdawi’s campus activism and pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University following the October 7 attacks.

Legal, political challenges surround Mahdawi’s detention

Mahdawi’s detention sparked immediate legal and political challenges. While federal district judges initially intervened to secure his release from custody, the legal landscape shifted significantly in mid-2026. The Board of Immigration Appeals ruled that the government had provided sufficient evidentiary backing for his removal, and an immigration judge officially ordered his deportation to Jordan in June 2026. 

Mahdawi subsequently appealed the decision to the US Court of Appeals, while federal appeals panels reinstated aspects of the government’s authority regarding his custody status.

While Mahdawi’s supporters have widely portrayed him as a progressive student leader targeted for exercising his freedom of speech, investigative work by David Collier and Rachel Feldman paints a portrait that contrasts sharply with that narrative

According to Collier and Feldman’s findings, the autobiographical personal narrative Mahdawi has shared across various media outlets, including CBS 60 Minutes and other publications, contains significant factual inconsistencies when cross-referenced against historical records from the Second Intifada, such as B’Tselem casualty databases and weekly updates from the Palestinian Center for Human Rights. 

Specifically, the investigators claim to have found that Mahdawi’s accounts regarding childhood incidents, such as the reported death of a best friend and the circumstances surrounding family members killed during the conflict, did not match recorded historical events, noting instead that the relatives he mourned were active combatants killed while launching attacks against Israeli forces rather than innocent civilians.

Furthermore, the investigative reports uncovered extensive online activity from a public Facebook group created and managed by Mahdawi alongside his mother, Abeer Shamali.

The uncovered digital record documents content stretching from 2012 through 2014, coinciding with the period Mahdawi was preparing to relocate to the United States, wherein Mahdawi and his family systematically promoted a program titled In the House of a Fighter, glorifying and honoring individuals linked to Palestinian terrorist organizations, including members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade.

Among the material highlighted in the investigation was a video posted to Mahdawi’s group featuring his mother participating in the infamous “Khaybar” chant, a slogan allegedly threatening violence against Jewish people.

Some Beth Jacob members push back against synagogue co-hosting fundraiser

As documented in Collier and Feldman’s investigation, the decision by the Beth Jacob Social Action Committee to co-host the fundraiser and invite Mahdawi for a pre-event discussion triggered immediate pushback among some of its own membership. When concerned congregants circulated the researchers’ findings across the synagogue’s internal mailing lists, leadership faced mounting pressure to address the red flags surrounding the event.

According to the published investigative records, rather than engaging with the documented evidence, prominent supporters within the synagogue sought to deflect criticism. Eric Jacobson, a synagogue member and scheduled speaker at the fundraiser, dismissed Collier’s investigative credentials and questioned the researchers’ linguistic proficiency in Arabic. In subsequent email exchanges documented in the reports, Jacobson questioned whether Collier was on the payroll of Israel’s Ministry of National Security.

The investigative files further detailed that when concerns continued to mount regarding the hosting of an individual associated with the glorification of terrorism, synagogue leadership ultimately postponed an initial in-house reception. Writing on behalf of the Social Action Committee, organizer Alice Silverman acknowledged that members held significant concerns, but explicitly stated that an event to address those issues “would serve a very different purpose than what we are hoping and planning for on August 9, which is to show our full support.”

Collier and Feldman claim in their report that attempts by independent researchers and concerned members to open a dialogue with synagogue organizers were met with institutional resistance. According to the journalists, leadership demonstrated no interest in discussing the documented evidence, choosing instead to push forward with an unconditional expression of solidarity for Mahdawi while attempting to silence internal dissent. 

“There is more about Mr. Mahdawi that has yet to come to light,” Feldman told The Jerusalem Post. “Despite the voluminous amount of local backlash I’ve received since we published, I’d rather keep the community informed and be hated for it than let them blindly cheer for someone whom I firmly believe has no good intentions for Vermonters or Americans.” 

The Beth Jacob Board also spoke to the Post, saying, “The Beth Jacob Synagogue Board supported our Social Action Committee’s request to help organize a fundraiser for a Vermont resident, Mohsen Mahdawi, because we believe the US government has violated his rights of free speech and due process.”

This post was originally published on here. 

Top regime officials will not travel to Pakistan until “appropriate conditions” are met, CBS News reported on Monday, citing comments by Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei.

According to CBS, the comments came amid a Pakistani invitation for Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and Iran’s top negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, to visit the country, with Baghaei saying that the trip will occur “whenever the appropriate conditions exist.”

The report noted that Baghaei did not elaborate much on what would be discussed with Pakistani intermediaries during such a trip, though he added that the primary focus would be “bilateral relations.”

Following the comments, Pakistan’s Interior Minister Moshin Naqvi visited Tehran on Tuesday, Pakistani sources told Reuters.

Naqvi meets with Araghchi as US, Iran near ‘some sort’ of deal

Naqvi met with Araghchi during the trip, according to a post on the Iranian minister’s Telegram.

Earlier on Tuesday, Pakistan said that the United States and Iran were close to “some sort” of deal, with fellow mediator Qatar saying talks on managing the Strait of Hormuz were at an advanced stage, despite reports of new attacks on shipping in regional waters.

This post was originally published on here. 

Zeev Salant, co-CEO of Omer Construction and Engineering, a veteran construction company that held its IPO in late 2025, said that Israel was better off without Palestinian laborers. 

“The state of the workforce in our industry is better for us than it was before the war. Wages have risen, but roughly, output is 30% higher. A workday for Palestinian workers used to begin at 6:30 a.m., with workers who had to get up at 4 a.m. to reach the construction site. They began shutting down the equipment at 4 p.m. at the latest.

“We’re better off without Palestinian workers,” he said.

Notably, he made the comments after Israel paused Palestinian laborers’ access to working in the West Bank.

“They celebrated the Muslim holidays and also took time off on the Jewish holidays. This is no longer the case. Work now begins at the site at 6:30 a.m. – 6:45 at the latest – and continues until 7 p.m. The laborers also work on Fridays, not to mention that work safety and quality have improved immeasurably. As far as we’re concerned, the current situation is much better than it used to be.”

The company’s leadership, which has been operating in the building sector for four decades, has a wealth of experience with the industry’s substantial changes and major crises.

The company is currently led by its three founders: Salant, chairperson Israel Rosenblatt, and co-CEO Baruch Hadad. Salant and Rosenblatt, who studied engineering together at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, established a construction planning firm and went on to found Omer Construction. Hadad joined the company shortly afterward.

“I welcome the change taking place in the workforce and the switch to foreign laborers. They have many advantages: quality, the number of managerial staff that must be kept on the site to obtain the required quality, and construction time,” Hadad said.

“In my opinion, these factors are making projects more economically worthwhile than in the past. We still have a shortage of workers, but if this trend continues, the construction industry will experience a significant upgrade.”

Since the war, we have heard many people in the industry talk about the inefficiency of Palestinian workers. Why did we never hear about this before?

“There was no alternative. For years, the Association of Contractors and Builders in Israel (ACBI) and other organizations of contractors tried to increase their foreign workforce, but the state refused to allow it. Despite sincere efforts and many attempts, Israeli workers did not come into the industry,” Salant said.

“We were stuck with the Palestinian workers. The government did not allow us to bring high-quality foreign personnel until the war began and the entry of Palestinian workers was halted. That was the situation.”

The real estate sector has undergone severe, possibly unprecedented, crises following the October 7, 2023 attack and the events that followed it. The personnel crisis was one of the worst – the entry of tens of thousands of Palestinian workers was banned overnight. There was also the problem of materials, which became both more expensive (a global trend), and less available because of Turkey’s ban on exports to Israel.

“The war and the ensuing crises were certainly real problems,” Hadad said.

“It was very difficult to meet the original timetable, and the state is overlooking the objective difficulties and refusing to recognize them. The state shuts down the industry for months, and no one wants to take this into account. The industry simply ground to a halt. The teams and staff, the entire activity of construction companies – things that cost a great deal of money – stopped working at the time. These things eventually caught up with us, as reflected in our profitability levels and the problems we had to overcome, but we got through it, and we’re still getting through it.”

Salant added that the company’s prestige was what allowed it to survive the crisis. 

“Our advantage is our good name. Even when there was a severe labor shortage at the beginning of the war, the workers who were available came to us. Two things are important to subcontractors: getting paid and getting paid on time. If you do that, a contractor will be loyal to you, and that’s what happened. That’s how we were able to narrow the gaps, and the timetable delays were confined to a few projects for a few months.”

Over its four decades in the industry, Omer Construction has primarily engaged in private-sector projects. The company was recently selected to carry out the NIS 480 million Gate project at the entrance to Jerusalem and a NIS 1.2 billion residential project in Acre. The company stresses that it works solely on mega projects, not on small ones.

“If we are offered a project for NIS 50-60 million, we won’t take it,” Salant declares. “It’s too small for us.”

Like many other construction companies, Omer Construction prefers to avoid public sector tenders whenever possible. “In public tenders, whether by local authorities or the state, the decisive element in the tender is usually the price,” Salant said.

“Companies seeking to win the tender make very low bids and try to make their living through changes and additions, which results in continual conflict with the party commissioning the work. That’s not for us. We work in the private market with very intelligent and wise developers who know that it’s better for them if their project is completed on schedule, with suitable quality, within the budget, and with the proper safety level. There are plenty of developers that wish to avoid constant friction with the contractor.”

Omer Construction completed its IPO in December 2025. Today, over six months later, the company’s market cap is over NIS 2 billion, and the return for the people who bought its shares is currently 68%.

Since its founding, Omer Construction has executed projects across Israel. The company currently works in three main spheres: construction, development (residential housing and urban renewal), and income-producing real estate. It also has a subsidiary, Gilmor Construction, which carries out small projects and specializes in finishing work. According to its 2025 report, the bulk of Omer Construction’s revenue comes from contracting – NIS 583 million, compared with NIS 73 million from residential real estate development and NIS 8 million from income-producing real estate.

One of the company’s objectives in its IPO was to reinforce and expand its activity in residential housing development, including urban renewal.

“We began working in development long before the IPO,” said Omer Construction CFO Gideon Kahlon, who, together with Rosenblatt, is responsible for the company’s development activity.

“In recent years, we have built a very substantial portfolio, but it is well known that development is something that takes years, especially urban renewal.

“We now have 13-14 urban renewal projects as well as development projects. When we reached the stage at which the projects required equity and investment on a fairly large scale, it became one of our considerations in holding the IPO – to raise money so that we could undertake the necessary financial investments without pressure, in the knowledge that our cash reserves could service the development projects, improve our negotiating position with the banks, and facilitate access to financial institutions.”

Do you see your development business outstripping your contracting business?

“It’s true that most of our current activity is in construction, but we’re looking ahead to the expansion of our development activity, which will also be reflected in our reports and results and will bring us substantial rewards – not in six months, but five, six, or seven years from now,” Kahalon said.  “We will have a great deal of development activity coming on top of our construction activity, which will increase the volume of our business.”

Was intergenerational transition a consideration?

“There is no doubt that becoming listed on the stock exchange makes an inter-generational transition easier than in a private company, but we have never been a family firm,” Salant said.

“We have always believed that if a family firm does not fall apart in the second generation, it will certainly happen in the third generation. That is why my children and those of Israel Rosenblatt have never worked in the company.

“There has recently been an exception to this rule – Baruch Hadad’s son, a construction engineer, is starting to work at the company – but Omer Construction is not a family firm, and there has never been any intention of making it one. It is a stable, veteran company. People work here for decades, are loyal to the company, are happy there, and look forward to going to work each day. That has always been our concept.”

Where will the company be in another 10 years?

“Operations in the construction sector will continue and remain as significant as they are today. The development business will grow and provide the company with a springboard,” he added.

Another important matter at the heart of the construction industry is work safety on building sites. Despite the growing attention it receives, the number of accidents remains high. 47 workers were killed on construction sites in 2025, compared with 37 in 2024 and 44 in 2023, even though the construction industry was completely shut down during part of each of these years because of the security situation.

“We emphasize safety very strongly in our company,” said Salant. “One of the things we do that happens at no other company is a safety test twice a year for all the company’s employees: once before Rosh Hashanah and once before Passover.

“This test is open to everyone. Those answering it correctly win cash prizes amounting to thousands of shekels. By now, this is a tradition, accompanied by a big buzz. Everyone studies the safety regulations and reviews the material in preparation for the test. This is our approach. We are very strict in this area and regard it as the most important part of everything we have spoken of – that everyone coming to the construction site in the morning should return home healthy at the end of the day.

“We work in a difficult and dangerous industry. It’s not the same as sitting in a bank office. There are many risks. It’s a constant battle from beginning to end. But with everything happening around us, safety is steadily improving. Once upon a time, we had to insist that workers wear safety shoes and protective helmets, but this is no longer necessary. We use technological means to keep track. We have safety supervisors and administrators. Every safety event is reported directly to the three of us — the company heads. Safety is routinely and closely monitored. We treat the small details as seriously as the big issues.”

Has the entry of foreign workers had an impact in this respect?

“Yes. As soon as we switched to foreign manpower, safety improved immeasurably because they are more disciplined. With foreign workers, it’s easier to keep safety under control,” Salant said. 

This post was originally published on here. 

The ongoing American blockade of the Strait of Hormuz is going to cost the Iranian economy around $18 billion annually, Majidreza Hariri, head of the Iran-China Joint Chamber of Commerce, warned the Iranian media site Khabar Online earlier this week.

“We must not get used to the blockade as we did with sanctions,” he told the site. “We should impose the cost of lifting the blockade on the US, even through war.”

Hariri advised that Iran end the blockade by any means necessary, whether through negotiations, threats, or renewing the war, the site reported. His comments came after Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian reportedly began advocating a strategy to circumvent the naval blockade.

Iran has invested in major infrastructure to increase truck-based trade

Iran has notably invested in major infrastructure to increase truck-based trade, raising the current level of bilateral trade from $3 billion to at least $10b., according to statements made by Iranian Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni last month.

Despite this investment, Hariri said that relying solely on land trade would mean restricting Iran’s import and export capacity to only 20%, and Iran lacks “appropriate relations” to trade with many of its neighbors.

Though not expanded upon, Hariri’s comments likely allude to the fact that Iran has launched attacks on its Gulf neighbors’ critical infrastructure in addition to the United States military infrastructure housed there.

Based on Hariri’s calculation, a container shipped from China to Iran would cost four times as much to transport by land as by sea, reaching an average price of around $12,000. With around two million containers imported annually, and an average additional cost of $9,000, he said this would translate to around $18b. in additional costs for Iranians.

“The worst thing that could happen today is for us to think that we can circumvent the naval blockade and try to run the country despite it,” he said. “We did something similar with the sanctions. Instead of lifting them or finding mechanisms to neutralize them, we turned to circumventing the sanctions, and the result was a weakened economy and major corruption.”

Cost of land transit could mean non-oil experts would no longer be economically viable

Hariri added that the cost of land transit would also mean non-oil exports – which he valued at around $50b. annually – would no longer be economically viable.

“The naval blockade will create fundamental challenges for the country, and if it continues, the country’s economy will grind to a halt. Our total foreign trade is $100b. a year, and adding $20b. in costs to it would bring the entire process to a standstill,” he said.

“Perhaps in the short term, for several weeks or at most a few months, we could use rail and roads to obtain urgent necessities, but this would only work as a necessary measure during a short-term emergency. This is simply about staying alive, but with this approach, the ability to continue operating will be lost.”

He added that the sanctions had already “dramatically increased the costs of our trade, reduced national revenues, and caused the economy to develop an exhausted structure,” and that attempts to circumvent them had led to corruption.

“With the blockade, these developments will occur on a scale several times larger if we convince ourselves that we can circumvent it. We must not allow our economy, or the enemy, to get used to our naval blockade,” he said.

Hariri said that even if it came to “pleading” or renewed war, “this naval blockade must end,” as the consequences of war wouldn’t come close to the economic problems and goods shortages that will result from the continued blockade.

“We must also eliminate the perception in the US that it can resort to such an action whenever it wants, and make it understand that the consequences of such a move could be severe,” he advised.

This post was originally published on here. 

Venture capital firm OurCrowd has appointed Cali Chill as chief executive officer, formally placing the seven-year company veteran at the head of the Jerusalem-based venture investment platform after he served as acting CEO since mid-2025.

Chill had been serving as acting CEO and chief operating officer after OurCrowd founder Jon Medved stepped back from day-to-day management for medical reasons. The company’s board of directors has now appointed Chill to the role on a permanent basis, OurCrowd announced Tuesday.

“I am honored to lead the next chapter of the OurCrowd story,” Chill told The Jerusalem Post. “The company is made up of some extremely talented and hard-working people, and it will be thanks to their true dedication and unwavering commitment that we take the OurCrowd investment platform to new heights.”

Chill added that he was “energized by what we can all build together from here.”

Company working to introduce more AI tools into its investment and asset-management process

The formal appointment follows a year in which OurCrowd said its leadership team focused on stabilizing operations, narrowing its investment strategy toward fewer high-conviction deals and assessing options for monetizing parts of its existing portfolio. The company has also been working to introduce more artificial intelligence-based tools into its investment and asset-management processes.

Earlier this month, OurCrowd announced one of the largest exits in its portfolio after Visa agreed to acquire Israeli fraud-prevention company BioCatch in a deal reportedly valued at $2.4 billion.

OurCrowd was an early investor in BioCatch and continued investing in the company as it grew. The acquisition remains subject to regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions and is expected to close by the end of Visa’s fiscal second quarter of 2027.

Ben Plotkin, chairman of OurCrowd’s board of directors, said the board had been encouraged by the company’s performance since Chill took over its day-to-day management.

‘I am excited about OurCrowd’s prospects’

“I am very pleased with the company’s progress and accomplishments over the past several quarters,” Plotkin said. “Since Cali took charge of the operation, the firm has been managed with increasing financial discipline and operational focus.”

“Having worked closely with Cali since the leadership transition of 2025, I am excited about OurCrowd’s prospects, and the board has full confidence in Cali’s ability to lead the firm through this next chapter,” he added.

Chill joined OurCrowd seven years ago as general counsel and later served as chief legal officer. He subsequently became head of funds, overseeing the company’s in-house and third-party investment funds, before serving as chief investment officer and chairman of OurCrowd’s investment committee.

Before joining OurCrowd, Chill served as general counsel of Nasdaq-listed Answers Corporation and AFCV Holdings, a private-equity-backed technology investor.

This post was originally published on here. 

Open displays of support for the Islamic regime in Iran were seen throughout Sunday’s Arbaeen Procession in London.

The Arbaeen Procession is an annual public march held to commemorate Imam Hussain, the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, who was martyred in Karbala, Iraq, in 680 CE.

Arbaeen marks the 40th day after his martyrdom and is designed to remember his believed stand against oppression and injustice. For those who cannot get to Iraq for the Karbala procession, there are many similar marches around the world.

Sunday’s Marble Arch procession, organized by Hussaini Islamic Trust UK, saw an estimated 35,000 people attend. According to the trust, this was the largest-ever gathering in the 46 years the event has been held in the UK.

While the entire purpose of the event is to remember and commemorate Hussaini’s stand against injustice and oppression, Sunday’s event saw significant support for Islamic regime figures.

The Jerusalem Post reviewed hundreds of videos and photos from the event, finding dozens (if not more) posters and flags of the late Ayatollah Khamenei, and hundreds of Islamic regime flags.

One in particular stood out – a poster by the Islamic Human Rights Commission saying ‘Choose the right side of history’ superimposed on a photo of Khamenei.

IHRC under investigation by UK since 2017 over regime ties

The IHRC has been investigated by the UK’s Charity Commission since 2017 for its alleged ties to the Iranian regime.

The watchdog issued an official warning to the IHRC in March 2023 after a statutory investigation into concerns of “misconduct and/or mismanagement.” However, the case remains ongoing, and no enforcement or penalty against the IHRC has been published to date.

IHRC also organizes the extremist annual event Al-Quds Day (“Jerusalem Day”).

Also visible in the footage from Sunday was a man wearing a keffiyeh featuring the three supreme leaders of the Islamic regime – Khomeini, Khameini Sr and Khameini Jr.

The brazen displays of pro-regime propaganda during Sunday’s Arbaneen march were particularly striking given the UK’s recent introduction of the National Security (State Threats) Act 2026.

The new legislation, brought into law in July, gives the Home Secretary new powers to designate organizations that are involved in state-threat activity linked to a foreign power.

On 17 July 2026, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) was officially designated.

This made expressing support for the IRGC a criminal offense.

Support for Ayatollahs could be seen as criminal offense

Given that the Ayatollahs are the ultimate authority over the IRGC, displays of support for them could be seen as support for the organization.

The Post reached out to the Metropolitan Police to confirm whether any action was taken.

Former Shadow Justice Secretary MP Nick Timothy wrote on X/Twitter: “You might be forgiven for thinking this is Tehran. But no, it is London. Where those who live among us openly celebrate the antisemitic and terrorist state of Iran.”

This post was originally published on here. 

Syria will host a delegation from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in the coming days to announce “significant progress” on the issue of nuclear materials, Syria’s Atomic Energy Commission said early on Tuesday, without providing further details.

Since the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad in late 2024, Syria’s new authorities have committed to working with the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog to address the legacy of nuclear activities during decades of Assad family rule.

Syria is not known to hold operational stockpiles of nuclear material for a weapons program, but Israel bombed a suspected Syrian nuclear reactor in 2007 in the country’s eastern province of Deir al-Zor.

The IAEA said last year that it had found traces of uranium in its investigation into that site. The traces were found at one of three unnamed locations “that were allegedly functionally related” to the site of interest in Deir al-Zor.

In June, IAEA chief Rafael Grossi said that as soon as conditions allow, the agency planned to conduct further work in the area to “achieve full clarity regarding past nuclear activities in Syria.”

Citing Israeli and US officials, Axios reported on Monday that the IAEA would soon remove nuclear material stored at a clandestine site in Syria after the administration of US President Donald Trump reached understandings with both Syria and Israel.

Syria has not commented on the removal of nuclear materials. A Syrian official with knowledge told Reuters that discussions with the IAEA on the nuclear material file as a whole were still underway, and that “no final agreement has been concluded.”

Syrian official: ‘No Israeli role’ in Syrian process with IAEA

“Consultations are underway on establishing an international support group to coordinate the necessary technical and legal assistance,” the official said.

The Syrian official said Syria was consulting with the IAEA to fulfill its own obligations and that “there is no Israeli role in this process.”

This post was originally published on here. 

IDF troops opened fire on a suspected Hamas sniper who posed an immediate threat near the Yellow Line in northern Gaza, the military said on Tuesday.

The troops identified a hit after firing at the man, according to the IDF, which did not provide further details on his condition.

The military said Southern Command troops remained deployed in the area under the ceasefire agreement and would continue to act against immediate threats.

The Yellow Line boundary 

The Yellow Line was established under the October 2025 ceasefire agreement as the boundary to which Israeli forces withdrew, leaving the IDF in control of roughly 53% of Gaza. It separates the Israeli-held area, largely in the east and south of the Strip, from the densely populated coastal area under Hamas control.

Israeli forces have since pushed beyond the original boundary, with senior military officials telling the Security Cabinet in July that the IDF controlled between 67% and 70% of the Strip.

However, senior officials from US President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace said this week that the IDF was now positioned along the original Yellow Line, with no forces or outposts remaining beyond it.

The officials said Israel had also halted targeted killings and was observing the ceasefire in practice, despite Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s public rejection of the board’s proposed 15-point framework for Gaza. Netanyahu has said the IDF will not withdraw further until Hamas is fully disarmed, but will continue to act against immediate threats to Israeli troops and civilians.

Amichai Stein contributed to this report.

This post was originally published on here. 

A Chinese citizen pleaded guilty in federal court to charges related to attempting to smuggle US military hardware to China in violation of the US Arms Export Control Act, according to the US Justice Department (DOJ) on Monday.

Dingwei Chen, a 29-year-old citizen of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), tried to purchase US-manufactured military-grade communications hardware, such as radios and satellite modems, on the black market.

Chen worked with individuals in China to acquire the communications systems from foreign arms dealers, eventually making a down payment of $40,000 to secure the technology.

The co-conspirators then made another payment in cryptocurrency, equivalent to $30,000, for the purchase of 10 satellite modems.

Chen, co-conspirators attempted to avoid law enforcement detection

Chen and his accomplices shifted to using cryptocurrency because, according to the DOJ, they noted that cryptocurrency wallets “are essentially anonymous bank accounts. Each transaction processed through them is private and untraceable.” 

Using encrypted apps to communicate in an effort to avoid detection, Chen claimed that the purchase of 10 modems was just an initial deal, and that he had enough funding to obtain tens of millions of dollars worth of military technology.

Chen and the co-conspirators also discussed plans to covertly export the hardware to China, initially weighing shipping them through Switzerland or retrieving them in Saipan in the Northern Mariana Islands. Eventually, they agreed to smuggle the military equipment through Mexico.

Such hardware is illegal to export without a license issued by the US Department of State’s Directorate of Defense Trade Controls, the DOJ stated. 

Chen’s guilty plea was accepted by a federal court in Salt Lake City, and he faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.

Smuggled equipment may have been used against US

Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg asserted that if Chen had been successful in diverting the communications equipment to China, it may have been used against the US in the future.

“Today’s guilty plea underscores the serious consequences for those who attempt to illegally procure, export, or transfer sensitive US-origin military equipment,” Acting Special Agent in Charge of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Investigations Spiros Karabinas added.

“Protecting American innovation and preventing critical technologies from reaching foreign adversaries, terrorist organizations, and transnational criminal organizations is a core national security mission,” Karabinas continued, praising law enforcement agencies for their collaboration on holding Chen accountable.

This post was originally published on here. 

Exceptionally low water levels on the Danube have exposed parts of the foundations of the ancient Constantine Bridge, giving Bulgarian archaeologists a rare opportunity to document what they describe as one of the Roman Empire‘s most impressive engineering achievements.

A succession of record-breaking heatwaves in Europe this summer has caused a severe drought in parts of the continent, affecting major waterways such as the Danube and the Rhine.

“For archaeologists, these moments are extremely valuable because nature briefly reveals an object that is hidden beneath the Danube for most of the time,” said Pavel Popov of the Regional Historical Museum in Pleven. “It gives us a rare opportunity to observe, document and study it in its real environment.”

The bridge, commissioned by Emperor Constantine I and inaugurated in 328 CE, linked the ancient city of Ulpia Oescus with Sucidava in what is now Romania. Stretching more than two km (1.2 miles), it is regarded as one of the longest bridges of antiquity, though short-lived. It is believed to have been largely destroyed around 367 CE.

A team from the Pleven museum carried out aerial photography and documentation of visible bridge remains, close to the village of Gigen in northern Bulgaria.

Researchers used drones to map and photograph the exposed remains, tracing the line of visible foundations and assessing their condition.

The Danube’s water levels have been receding all across Europe, revealing finds from as far back as the Ice Age.

Near the Serbian port of Prahovo, the Danube’s receding water levels have revealed dozens of German battleships sunken during World War II.

At least 20 warships can be seen emerging from the Danube, according to CBS News, adding that they are believed to have  belonged to Nazi Germany’s Black Sea fleet, sunken by the German’s during their retreat from Romania near the end of the war.

Remains of two Nazi soldiers found in Budapest 

On the riverbank near Batthyány Square in Budapest, the German War Graves Commission (Volksbund) announced last week that the skeletal remains of two Nazi soldiers had been found alongside a World War II DKW NZ 350-1 motorcycle.

The dog tags of both soldiers are complete, Volksbund noted, explaining that this likely meant the two soldiers had been declared missing as no offical notice of their deaths had been recorded at the time.

The two are expected to be buried in the Budaörs German Soldiers Cemetery outside of Budapest.

Ice Age mammoth remains unearthed in Bulgaria

Two weeks ago, the Bulgarian News Agency (BTA) reported that the remains of the ancient mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) were found in northern Bulgaria after Danube’s water levels receded to a record low.

The animal’s remains were found by a local resident of the Ryahovo village, who noticed the unusual find on the river bed. Villagers then alerted specialists in the Regional History Museum in the nearby town of Ruse.

Ryahovo Mayor Hristina Ivanova shared with BTA that the area was particularly interesting from a historical perspective, and that over the years, “various finds have been discovered here, including animal remains, vessels and other objects.”

Miriam Sela-Eitam contributed to this report.

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The jury in Luigi Mangione’s murder trial next month on charges of gunning down a health insurance executive on a Manhattan sidewalk will be anonymous, the judge overseeing the case said at a hearing on Tuesday.

New York State Justice Gregory Carro did not explain why jurors would remain anonymous. While not the norm in US criminal trials, judges often decide to shield jurors’ identities from the public in high-profile cases where there is concern jurors may be subject to harassment or intimidation.

Mangione, 28, is accused of shooting UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson outside a hotel in December 2024. The killing was widely condemned by public officials but became emblematic of many Americans’ frustration with health insurance industry practices.

Mangione has pleaded not guilty to murder, weapons, and forgery charges brought by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg. He also pleaded not guilty to stalking charges in a separate federal case.

At Tuesday’s hearing, Carro also ruled that an overflow courtroom would be made available for the press and the public to witness the trial if the main courtroom fills to capacity.

Prosecutors say they can prove Mangione’s guilt with hundreds of hours of surveillance video, fingerprints, DNA, a cellphone, a gun with matching ballistics and a notebook in which Mangione allegedly wrote of hating insurers and wanting to kill.

Mangione’s lawyers have revealed almost nothing about their potential trial strategy, though a July court filing indicated they might argue Mangione lost control of his actions due to an extreme mental health breakdown. They have not conceded that he was the shooter.

Former UnitedHealthcare CEO shot dead outside hotel

Thompson led UnitedHealth Group’s insurance unit before he was shot dead in the early morning outside a hotel where an investor conference was taking place.

Graphic footage of the killing and a five-day manhunt for a suspect made the case a media fixture and social media sensation. Mangione was arrested in Pennsylvania.

His trial in the federal case is scheduled to begin in January.

This post was originally published on here. 

Almost half of Britons want to see fewer or no Israeli immigrants in the UK, a new YouGov poll named “Britons have a more negative view of immigration in 2026 than in 2016” has revealed.

When asked, “What countries do Britons think we should allow more and fewer migrants to come from?” 23% of respondents said there should be less immigration from Israel to the UK, and 24% said there should be none.

This meant a total of 47% wanted either a partial or total reduction in Israelis being allowed to live in Britain.

This represented an eight-point increase from 39% in 2016.

The YouGov poll also explored how the views of those who voted either Remain or Leave in the Brexit referendum have changed since 2016 regarding migrant nationalities.

The overall finding was that Remain and Leave voters have generally changed their opinions in the same direction. There were not many cases where, for example, Remain voters became more welcoming toward a nationality while Leave voters became less welcoming toward that same nationality.

But there are some interesting exceptions.

Voters have become more negative

Notably, Remain voters have become more negative towards migrants from the US and Israel, compared to virtually no change among Leave voters. The percentage of Remain voters who wanted fewer or no migrants from Israel increased from 27% in 2016 to 41% in 2026, while in both 2016 and 2026, 52% of Leave voters said there should be fewer or no migrants from Israel.

On the other hand, Leave voters have become substantially more welcoming toward Polish, French, German and Japanese migrants.

Splitting by political party (determined by who the respondent voted for in the 2024 elections), the highest levels of negative views towards Israeli migrants were seen among Reform UK and Green voters, at roughly 52-53%.

Labour and Conservative voters are around the mid-to-high 40s, while Liberal Democrat voters are lowest, at around 41%.

Overall, Russia recorded the highest combined opposition to immigration at 58%, followed by Pakistan at 52%, Nigeria at 48%, Israel at 47%, Egypt and India at 44%, and Turkey at 43%.

This post was originally published on here. 

American forces fired at a Panama-flagged ship in the Gulf of Oman that was reportedly attempting to bypass the US embargo on Iranian ports, the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday, citing a US official with knowledge of the matter. 

US Central Command troops fired a missile from a helicopter at the rudder of the Vela Nova, a Panamanian-flagged container ship, earlier on Tuesday morning. 

The US official told the WSJ that the ship’s crew was transferred to another vessel after the attack. No casualties or injuries have been reported at this time, and all of the ship’s crew members were accounted for. 

Maritime security firm Vanguard claimed that the US missile “struck the vessel, causing a fire that was subsequently extinguished.”

This comes as the US and Iran remain at a standstill over peace talks to end the American blockade of Iranian ports and create a broader-reaching ceasefire.

Houthis fire at ship in Bab el-Mandeb Strait 

Also on Tuesday, the Iran-backed Houthis reportedly killed three crew members of a Tanzanian-flagged cargo ship in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait.

The Houthis have not claimed the attack, though two Yemeni coast guard sources and two military officials in the government confirmed the attack to Reuters. 

If confirmed, the fatalities on the Tanzania-flagged Tihamah would be the first deaths in a Houthi strike on a ship since the Middle East conflict was triggered by US-Israeli attacks on Iran at the end of February, Reuters reported.

Two Pakistanis and one Indonesian person were killed as the ship sailed from Salalah in Oman via Djibouti, the Yemeni sources said.

After the attack, the crew lost control of the vessel and were approached by Yemeni coastguard, they added.

This post was originally published on here. 

The Likud Party’s secretariat was set to vote Tuesday on approving reserved slots on the party’s Knesset slate for three ministers selected by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ahead of the elections.

During the vote, the party’s top internal court issued an interim order blocking one of the reservations for Likud Central Committee Chairman Haim Katz, who also holds multiple ministerial portfolios. 

Additional reserved slots are set to be granted to Defense Minister Israel Katz and Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar. 

The formal requests to reserve several slots for Netanyahu’s appointees were submitted to the Likud secretariat. While the vote was reportedly underway, the party’s top internal court issued the interim order freezing only the proposed slot for Haim Katz.

The court noted that the Central Committee chairman had already registered to run in the August 17 primaries and began campaigning. If the reserved slot were approved, he could stop campaigning, only to be placed at a disadvantage if the court later overturned the approval and he was forced back into the race. The court therefore suspended the vote on Katz’s slot pending a further decision.

The vote by the Likud secretariat on Tuesday comes after Netanyahu’s ability to control the slate was expanded last month.

The premier was granted the authority to determine eight slots within the first 30 spots on the party list last month following a vote on the controversial decision by the Likud Central Committee.

The party said its internal court ruled last week that the defense minister should receive a reserved slot, “even though he was already expected to reach the top of the list,” in order to “allow him to focus on security needs rather than engage in politics at this time.”

Sa’ar to receive slot upon party’s merger with Likud

Likud also stated that Sa’ar would receive a reserved slot as part of the merger agreement between his party and the Likud and that the Likud Central Committee chairman would receive a slot due to his senior position in the party.

Sa’ar had announced in 2025 that his New Hope-United Right would be merging with Likud, and would be returning to the party. He previously resigned from the Likud in 2020, heavily criticizing Netanyahu at the time. 

Likud had announced Monday that Netanyahu’s first reserved slot would go to entrepreneur and businessman Oren Dobronsky. The party announced shortly after 1 a.m. on Tuesday that the three ministers were also expected to receive reserved slots.

The changes to the party’s primaries have led to fierce internal tensions, with some party members in favor and others strongly against.

A fierce critic of changing the system has been MK Tally Gotliv, who is viewed as a candidate who would receive broad support from registered party members.

Gotliv sharply criticized the Tuesday decision to reserve the slots for the three ministers, condemning the defense minister.

She called the decision to grant Katz a reserved slot “a disgraceful move that mocks Likud voters, who understand one thing more than all the veteran ministers: the need to fight the legal establishment that is persecuting the right-wing government and right-wing figures.”

Gotliv later said she planned to petition the Likud’s internal court for a further hearing over the decision to grant Katz the reserved slot.

Netanyahu reportedly has held several meetings with the Likud Central Committee chairman Katz, seeking to bridge disagreements over the primary system and secure internal support for changing the system.

There were also reports that Netanyahu has threatened to leave Likud if the proposed changes were not advanced.

Those within the party who oppose changing the primaries have argued that it will cause those who would otherwise score highly in the primaries to fall further down the list.

The Likud has for years prided itself on conducting primaries in which over 100,000 of its registered members are eligible to vote for the Knesset list. Netanyahu pushed to change the system in recent weeks ahead of the primaries, which were set for August 17.

Parties are not required to hold primaries in Israel, and only a few do so.

The Likud primaries are expected to be highly competitive. Likud currently has around 40 ministers and MKs serving in the government and Knesset, but recent polls project the party winning only about 25 seats, leaving many at risk of losing their places on the party’s Knesset list.

Likud primary issue comes as October elections loom 

The debate on how to hold the Likud primaries comes ahead of the general elections, which are set to take place on October 27.

The primaries determine the Likud’s Knesset slate, with the party chairman placed first. Registered members then vote for candidates on the national list, while members from geographic districts vote for candidates from their respective districts.

Candidates chosen on the national list are combined with district representatives and places that guarantee representation for groups including women, immigrants, young members, and minorities. The regulations also reserve certain positions for candidates chosen by the party chairman.

In the 2022 primaries, for example, the first group of positions after the party chairman was largely filled by nationally elected candidates, while district positions and guaranteed-representation slots were inserted farther down the slate. Netanyahu was also given several reserved positions.

The precise locations of those different categories are determined before each election through the party’s temporary election regulations. That is why the current fight has centered not only on whether primaries will take place, but on how much of the resulting slate the members will actually control.

The tensions surrounding the slots also come after the Tel Aviv District Court on Monday rejected Likud MK Afif Abed’s attempt to restore a narrowly approved change allowing current and former MKs, ministers and deputy ministers to run in the party’s district primaries, leaving the restrictions in place ahead of the August 17 vote.

Judge Yaakov Shaked nevertheless sided with Abed on a central issue in the dispute, ruling that the Likud’s top internal court had exceeded its authority when it found that allowing incumbent politicians to compete in district races violated the party’s principle of equality.

This post was originally published on here. 

Watch this episode without interruptions.

Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

In this episode of the Defense and Tech Podcast, host Anna Ahronheim sits down with Yoni Heilbronn, co-founder and managing partner of IL Ventures, the Tel Aviv fund backing disruptive technology for legacy industries: logistics, smart manufacturing, robotics, and supply chain.

Ask Heilbronn what world leaders are underestimating, and he doesn’t start with a weapons system. The order that held for almost 80 years after World War II is gone, he tells Ahronheim, adding that globalization went with it. A tariff, a war, or a few men in Yemen shooting at cargo ships can now reprice an entire industry in a week.

European officials will say X, Y, and Z in public, says the IL Ventures co-founder and former CMO of automotive cybersecurity pioneer Argus. Behind the scenes, the purchase orders keep arriving at Israeli companies.

He also declines to sell the hype. Is the surge into defense tech a durable need or a bubble? Yes and yes, he says.

Germany alone is putting in more than $100 billion by his count, but sales cycles are long, development cycles longer, and he doubts there are enough integrators to produce the exits venture funds are built on. Governments are the other bottleneck: tenders and purchasing departments move at a speed startups can’t survive.

Heilbronn describes hacking a car’s head unit in a Tel Aviv office and hopping straight into the manufacturer’s corporate network. He explains why data centers now belong underground, why Israeli founders should look to Mexico and Brazil rather than New York, and how one portfolio company on the Lebanese border ages whiskey in weeks. In every mess, he says, there’s an opportunity.

This post was originally published on here. 

Abdul El-Sayed’s narrow victory in last week’s Democratic Senate primary in Michigan represents more than another local election. El-Sayed defeated Rep. Haley Stevens by less than one percentage point after outside groups supporting her spent more than $60 million, including more than $30 million from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and organizations associated with support for Israel. He won in a state that US President Donald Trump carried in 2024 and will now face Republican Mike Rogers in November.

But one of the most notable aspects of El-Sayed’s campaign was not only what he said, but where he said it and whom he chose to say it with.

El-Sayed, who has called for an end to US military aid to Israel, made new media a central part of his campaign. In the final days before the vote, he walked through Detroit with online influencers, met with content creators, and spent a significant portion of Election Day giving interviews to streamers before turning to traditional media outlets. One of the most prominent figures alongside him was Hasan Piker, an Israel hater and one of the most influential political voices on Twitch.

Piker appears alongside El-Sayed at University of Michigan, Michigan State University

The connection was more than symbolic. In April, Piker appeared alongside El-Sayed at the University of Michigan and Michigan State University. In Ann Arbor, hundreds of young people stood in the cold in a line stretching outside the venue. Veteran Rep. Debbie Dingell, who attended the event, said she had not seen a crowd like it at a political event that year.

The scene illustrated something American politicians are increasingly beginning to understand: Younger voters are not getting their news primarily from CNN, NBC, or newspapers. Increasingly, they are being introduced to politics through streamers.

Piker has more than three million followers on Twitch, and his daily broadcasts can last seven hours or more. From his home studio, he moves between online videos, news, gaming, jokes, and political analysis, speaking in a style far removed from that of a traditional television commentator.

More broadly, an entire ecosystem of podcasts, streamers, and content creators on the American Left is gradually becoming political infrastructure for progressive candidates. It gives them a way to bypass the Democratic Party’s traditional gatekeepers, recruit activists, and build loyal audiences. Piker is one of the clearest examples of the phenomenon.

When it comes to Israel, Piker leaves little room for ambiguity. He describes himself as an anti-Zionist who believes that “Zionism is a racist ideology.” Over the years, he has made particularly harsh statements against Israel and has even said that Hamas is “a thousand times better” than the Israeli government. He explained the remark as a comparison between the scale of killing, rather than as support for Hamas’s domestic policies.

His critics, including Jewish figures and Democratic politicians, accuse him of crossing the line between criticism of Israel and antisemitic rhetoric. Piker rejects that characterization and argues that his criticism is directed at the state and Zionism, not at Jews.

Piker says Israel bears responsibility for October 7

Even after October 7, Piker did not moderate his position. He has said that, in his view, Israel bears fundamental responsibility even for the events of October 7 because of decades of “occupation and apartheid.”

That worldview has made him a focus of controversy within the Democratic Party. His supporters see him as someone willing to say openly what the establishment refuses to say. His opponents see him as an example of the increasingly radical discourse toward Israel among younger Americans.

Piker’s connection to this political media world began before Twitch. His uncle, Cenk Uygur, who is also anti-Israel, is 56, was born in Istanbul, and moved to the US at age eight. Uygur founded The Young Turks, one of the oldest and most successful progressive news and commentary ventures online.

Piker, 35 and born in the US, began his professional career working for his uncle at TYT before gradually moving into streaming and becoming a full-time independent creator in 2020. If Uygur belonged to the first generation that proved it was possible to build a digital alternative to cable news, Piker represents the next generation: less a “news program” and more an almost daily relationship between the broadcaster and his community.

Despite all this, it is important not to attribute more power to the two than they actually have. They did not create the shift in attitudes toward Israel on the American Left by themselves, and Piker certainly cannot take credit for El-Sayed’s victory.

El-Sayed’s campaign held more than 500 events, visited 110 cities, and built a network of about 12,000 volunteers, according to campaign figures. But the campaign’s use of influencers such as Piker was deliberate, and El-Sayed intensified that approach in the final days before the vote.

The phenomenon also extends far beyond his campaign. Left-wing new media is becoming a meaningful part of fundraising, activist mobilization, and efforts to put new candidates on the political map.

In Michigan, that connection carries particular significance. The state is home to one of the most significant Arab-American communities in the United States, and the war in the Middle East has become a domestic political issue there. Arab-American leaders in the state said during the primary that attempts by the Democratic establishment to distance candidates and media figures because of their criticism of Israel could instead push voters to stay home, support a third-party candidate, or even shift toward Republicans.

This may be the most important significance of El-Sayed’s victory for Israel. It does not prove that all young Americans have become anti-Zionists, nor does it show that the entire Democratic Party is moving in Piker’s direction. Nearly half of primary voters supported Stevens.

But it does show that a candidate calling for an end to military aid to Israel can win in a key state, and that an openly anti-Zionist content creator with millions of followers is no longer merely an Internet phenomenon. He can share a stage with a Senate candidate, draw hundreds of young people to an event, and become a legitimate part of a national election campaign.

Israel is belatedly beginning to understand that this is no longer an arena that can be dismissed as marginal. The battle over American public opinion is not taking place only in briefing rooms in Washington or television studios in New York.

Part of it unfolds for hours every day in front of a webcam, in a rapidly moving chat on the side of the screen, and in clips cut from a seven-hour broadcast that can become political material on TikTok, X, and YouTube within minutes.

El-Sayed’s victory in Michigan is not Hasan Piker’s victory, but it provides strong evidence that the world Piker represents is already part of American politics rather than something operating outside it.

This post was originally published on here. 

Kolthoum Akbari, a 56-year-old who has come to be known by the title of Iran’s “Black Widow,” was sentenced to death after she allegedly confessed to killing 12 out of her 13 husbands, the Mazandaran Judiciary’s public relations office told Iranian state media on Sunday.

Only one of Akbari’s victims said they forgave her for the death of their male relative, while a second family promised to give forgiveness once diyah (blood money) was paid. All of Akbari’s property is to be confiscated by the courts.

Akbari and the families of her alleged victims have been given 20 days to deliver their appeal to be considered by a higher court, after which the verdict will be final.

The 56-year-old was first arrested in September 2023 after she was suspected of murdering her 82-year-old “temporary” husband. It was soon discovered that the Black Widow had married a dozen times beforehand, and each marriage ended in the death of her husband.

In Iran, sigheh, or mut’ah (temporary marriage), is a legally recognized form of marriage that unites a man and woman for a predetermined period. The union requires a specified mahr (dowry) and verbal contract, but no witnesses. Unlike permanent marriages, under Article 940 of Iran’s Civil Code, temporary spouses do not automatically inherit.

Akbari had reportedly received a dowry of 5 billion rials for her temporary marriage to her 82-year-old husband. Months before the elderly man passed, he told his children that Akbari had forced him to take medication for his heart and blood pressure, and he would often fall unconscious after consuming it. He claimed at the time that Akbari was trying to kill him.

Akbari’s children accuse her of murder following elderly husband’s death

After his death, his children went to the police and filed a complaint against their father’s temporary wife, accusing her of murder. It was during the course of the investigation that Akbari confessed to killing the 82-year-old and 11 others from 2000 onwards.

Akbari said she would initially marry the men temporarily and, after living with them for around two to three months, would kill her victims by giving them pills or dissolving the pills in their drinks.

This post was originally published on here. 

The High Court of Justice sharply criticized the Knesset on Tuesday for failing to provide dedicated polling stations in nursing homes and assisted-living facilities for the upcoming election, but appeared reluctant to impose through a court ruling an arrangement lawmakers had chosen not to enact.

Supreme Court President Isaac Amit said the system used in the previous two elections had “worked perfectly,” speaking from his experience as chairman of the Central Elections Committee.

“This is the first time the Knesset is going backward instead of expanding” access to voting, Amit said, adding that the decision was regrettable and that, in his personal view, the arrangement should have been retained.

The court did not issue a ruling at the end of the hearing.

The three petitions, heard by Amit and justices Ofer Grosskopf and Gila Canfy-Steinitz, challenge the Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee’s decision not to advance legislation allowing special polling stations to be placed in nursing homes and assisted-living facilities.

Such stations were operated during the previous two elections under temporary legislation introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Central Elections Committee recommended making the arrangement available again, but the Knesset committee declined to advance the proposal after it failed to receive broad support.

The decision leaves many elderly residents dependent on ordinary polling arrangements, even when the polling station assigned to their registered address is outside the facility where they live. Some residents have limited mobility or require wheelchairs, walkers, escorts or assistance from staff to leave their homes.

Knesset’s decision could prevent some residents from voting altogether

The petitions were filed by dozens of nursing-home and assisted-living residents, as well as organizations representing older Israelis. They argue that the Knesset’s decision could prevent some residents from voting altogether, violating the constitutional right to vote and the principle of equality in elections.

Attorney Yuval Yoaz, representing one group of petitioners, told the court that there was no dispute that elderly Israelis must be able to vote. The question, he said, was whether the state had done enough to ensure that the right could actually be exercised.

The petitioners proposed two possible solutions. The first would have the court temporarily apply the previous statutory arrangement to the coming election. Yoaz argued that this would not require the court to design a new voting system, since the mechanism had already been enacted and successfully operated.

Alternatively, they asked the court to interpret the Central Elections Committee’s existing powers broadly and require it to establish suitable polling stations under the law as it currently stands.

The justices, however, repeatedly questioned whether the first proposal would improperly place the court in the Knesset’s role.

Grosskopf noted that lawmakers had made a deliberate decision not to reenact what had previously been a temporary arrangement.

“There are many laws that are not enacted for political reasons,” he said. “We cannot replace the Knesset.”

Canfy-Steinitz similarly questioned the suggestion that an existing arrangement had simply been allowed to expire, noting that the previous rules were temporary provisions and that enacting them for the 2026 election would require new legislation.

Amit nevertheless made clear his dissatisfaction with the Knesset’s decision. He noted that election law has gradually expanded special voting arrangements for other groups, including police officers, prison guards and hospital patients.

He also questioned why provisions addressing voting by sailors remained on the books while the growing elderly population had been left without a dedicated arrangement.

Attorney Yitzhak Bart, representing the Knesset, argued that the previous system had been adopted specifically because pandemic restrictions made entering and leaving nursing homes particularly difficult. Those restrictions no longer exist, he said, and the court should not create a legislative arrangement that the Knesset had declined to enact.

The Central Elections Committee, meanwhile, said it was attempting to provide a partial solution within its existing authority.

Attorney Yonatan Berman of the State Attorney’s Office said the committee had contacted approximately 290 nursing homes and assisted-living facilities about placing regular regional polling stations on their premises. Where technically possible, those stations would also be designated accessible, allowing people who declare that they have limited mobility to vote there using double envelopes.

So far, 65 institutions have agreed, while discussions with dozens of others remain underway. Fifty-six facilities have objected, in part because a regional polling station would have to admit voters from outside the facility and remain operational through the vote count.

Proposed solution depends on each facility’s consent

Unlike the dedicated stations used in the previous elections, the proposed solution depends on each facility’s consent and would not necessarily serve residents whose registered address places them in another voting district.

Berman acknowledged that the plan would not provide a complete answer. Where a polling station cannot be placed inside a facility, the committee will seek to establish an accessible station within a reasonable distance, he said. Approximately 3,500 accessible polling stations are expected to operate nationwide.

Amit said he was persuaded that the Central Elections Committee was making a serious effort and asked it to examine further options, including whether facilities that had refused could be identified so residents and advocacy organizations could approach them.

The committee has not yet formally approved the placement of the polling stations. Its decision is expected by August 18, the statutory deadline 70 days before the election.

The court said a decision on the petitions would be issued separately.

This post was originally published on here. 

Some Jewish school principals in Britain spend more time dealing with security than with education, the BBC reported on Tuesday, based on an upcoming review on educational antisemitism.

The government-commissioned independent review is led by David Bell, who previously served as permanent secretary at the Department for Education from 2006 to 2011 and chief inspector of schools in England between 2002 and 2005. 

The final version of the review is due to be released in autumn, and the BBC reported that it will likely include training programs for teachers, standardization in reporting incidents of antisemitism, and education about antisemitism for students.

Bell told the BBC that Jewish students in the UK were “facing a pressure – and indeed one might say even a crisis – that is not the experience of other communities in this country.”

“When you think about antisemitism, you assume that it’s going to be directed towards adults,” he said. “What’s been quite shocking is the extent to which antisemitism is encountered by children and young people.”

Jewish student told he should be in gas chamber

One of the teenagers who gave evidence for the review spoke about the antisemitic harassment he had faced in school.

“People were telling me that I should be in a gas chamber. Swastikas were drawn in lots of classrooms and Nazi salutes became quite widespread,” he explained. “Obviously for someone whose family suffered in the Holocaust it was incredibly difficult to have to deal with comments like that.”

However, the teenager also said that a single class about modern antisemitism had helped significantly.

“Attitudes changed immediately, and people did apologize to me. I experienced a lot less antisemitism. If it works in my school, there’s no reason that it can’t work in every school across the country.”

Security against antisemitic attack is ‘overwhelming priority,’ school principal says

Several school principals spoke to the BBC anonymously, confirming the extent to which Jewish students and faculty struggle with the threat of antisemitic attacks.

“In recent years [security] has become an overwhelming priority and increased a significant amount,” one stated. “There have been weeks where approximately 90% of my time has been spent on security-related matters.

“Security concerns can become one of the many things that headteachers carry with them beyond the school day and, quite literally, can be among the things that keep me awake at night.”

Another said that the required emphasis on security issues prevented him from “working on educational priorities and on improving our school – instead my focus and time has been spent on security, something that should be a given for every child in this country.”

“Antisemitism has no place in our society, let alone our education system,” Education Secretary Lucy Powell stated to the BBC. “Jewish children and staff should never face hatred or prejudice, and every school and college must be equipped to tackle it when it happens.”

This post was originally published on here. 

In an odd twist, Washington is now offering Saudi Arabia a pathway to the very nuclear activity – uranium enrichment – that has been the prime target of American bombing in Iran. 

If Iran gets the bomb and the kingdom exploits its “peaceful” nuclear program and follows suit, Israel may be pressed but will hold its own. But that’s only if Riyadh gets the bomb. The US deal, however, as currently drafted, is a prescription for much wider proliferation which no one, including Israel, is likely to survive.

Why? Deterrence will fail as the number of parties deterred rises. And, make no mistake, once Washington greenlights nuclear fuel-making for Saudi Arabia, the spread won’t stop there.

First up is Iran, which insists it has an “inalienable” right to enrich uranium. The United States denies this, but conceded in its first understanding with Iran this June that if Tehran meets certain terms, it may exercise a “conditional” right. 

The problem is, even if Iran’s enrichment activities are “safeguarded,” they still can be hijacked to make a bomb. That’s why critics demand that any final agreement prevents Iran from enriching, full stop. They’ve got a point. If the Saudi deal proceeds as drafted, Iran can rightly insist that it should have no less a right.

Second up is the United Arab Emirates. Under the nuclear cooperative agreement that the United States negotiated and finalized in 2009, the Emirates agreed to forswear enriching uranium and recycling plutonium – processes that can bring states within weeks of acquiring a nuclear bomb.

That agreement, however, had a proviso: if Washington offered any of the UAE’s neighbors more generous nuclear cooperation, Abu Dhabi could renegotiate the terms of its agreement. It threatened to do that in 2015 when the US allowed Tehran to continue to enrich uranium under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (the Iran Nuclear Deal). 

Washington pushed back, noting that the Iran Deal wasn’t a formal nuclear cooperative agreement. Unfortunately, the US-Saudi deal is.

Then there are Egypt and Turkey. Both have large nuclear power plant construction projects underway. Both previously refused American requests to follow the UAE’s example and forswear making nuclear fuel. 

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his heir-apparent, Hakan Fidan, both have said that if other nations get nuclear weapons, Turkey should. It’s currently developing an intercontinental ballistic missile.

Washington and Riyadh downplay these worries. The Saudis demand America trust them. Meanwhile, US Energy Secretary Chris Wright insisted there is no nuclear proliferation danger, and that the current Saudi deal will “reinforce global nonproliferation standards.” It’s hard to see how.

The secretary’s pitch is a hard sell. For starters, Riyadh has refused to adopt International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspections that would allow them to investigate undeclared nuclear sites. A total of 144 nations have accepted such inspections; Saudi Arabia has refused. Apparently, Riyadh is wary of outsiders checking on what it might be up to.

But Wright argued that there is a way to “blackbox” whatever uranium enrichment plant the US might build for the Saudis. Possession, though, is 90% of the law: whatever is built on Saudi soil can be seized by Saudis. The Saudis also could bait-and-switch, using the declared enrichment activity to obscure covert efforts. Pakistan might help the Saudis carry this out.

Opening the gates

All of this recommends holding the line against even a “little bit” of nuclear fuel-making in states that lack nuclear weapons. The White House counters that we must be realistic that it is better to be in the nuclear slave trade and control it than not. Riyadh, after all, has threatened to take their business to China or Russia – and they have absolutely no scruples.

Really?

The last country to offer nuclear fuel-making assistance to a non-nuclear weapons state wasn’t Russia or China. It was the US. It did this 60 years ago, when it helped India reprocess nuclear weapons-usable plutonium that in 1974 fueled a “peaceful nuclear explosive.”

Since then, no state – including the United States – has offered nuclear fuel-making assistance to any non-nuclear weapons state.

Pushing the current US-Saudi nuclear deal would reverse that standard and open the sluice gates to nuclear proliferation. This, in turn, would pose a threat not just to Israel, but the world. 

In 2009, Washington renegotiated its agreement with the UAE and set the right standard of no fuel-making. It should do the same with Riyadh.

The author is the founder and the executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center (NPEC) in Washington.

This post was originally published on here. 

With Hamas and Hezbollah substantially weakened, Iran is increasingly relying on the Houthis as its principal remaining proxy capable of exerting sustained military and economic pressure on the US and its regional partners.

Currently, as a complement to Iran’s campaign in the Strait of Hormuz, the Houthis are attempting to exploit their control of the Bab al-Mandab Strait, situated at the foot of the Red Sea and controlling access to the Suez Canal.

Simultaneously with harrying the shipping in the strait, they are striking targets in Saudi Arabia in conjunction with Iran, whose 2023 pact with Saudi Arabia has been consigned to the trash.

On February 28, 2026, in response to the US-Israel attack, Iran launched missiles and armed drones against Saudi Arabia and other Gulf States, mainly because they harbored US bases, but also to punish and deter both Saudi Arabia and other governments for their close connection to the US.

Iranian strikes were reported to have hit energy facilities in Saudi Arabia, including igniting a fire at the Ras Tanura oil refinery. The Prince Sultan Air Base was also targeted by drone attacks, then and later.

On July 16, Reuters reported that Iran had instructed the Houthis to prepare to close the Bab al-Mandab Strait, citing multiple regional and Iranian sources. The directive to do so would be given if the US struck Iran’s power grid or energy infrastructure.

Although the order was described as a contingency directive, the Houthis reportedly began positioning missiles and drones near the strait while awaiting any further authorization.

Four days later, on July 20, Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree appeared on television to announce that “a maritime embargo against the criminal Saudi enemy” would be imposed immediately. He described it as an “eye for an eye” measure in response to what the Houthis called Saudi Arabia’s long-running blockade of Yemen and a recent attack on Sanaa International Airport.

The result is a second maritime choke point, augmenting Iran’s pressure on international shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. The Houthis are targeting Saudi oil exports and commercial tankers using Saudi ports, thus attempting to close off the principal alternative export route available after disruptions in Hormuz.

The operation as a whole is, in effect, a joint effort by Iran and its Yemeni ally to exert maximum pressure on global oil markets.

A few days later, in response, the Saudi-led coalition struck Houthi targets in Yemen.
In short, Iran-Saudi rivalry is being fought out mainly on the Houthis’ front, the crisis is being sustained by the Houthis’ military action, and the Saudi coalition clearly regards the Houthis as part of Iran’s regional leverage network.

But Saree’s TV address clearly revealed that, from the Houthis’ point of view, two wars are overlapping, and in taking up the fight, the Houthis are killing two birds with one stone. Saree referred to Saudi Arabia’s “blockade” of Yemen, and its strike against the airport at Sanaa, once Yemen’s capital.

So in attacking Saudi Arabia, the Houthis are not only acting in direct support of Iran, but are also striking at the ally of their main opponent in Yemen’s long-running civil war – the internationally recognized Yemeni government.

Tehran knows oil is the globe’s Achilles’ heel

Since 2014, the Houthis, having overthrown the official Yemeni government, have controlled Sanaa and much of north-western Yemen. That government – now based principally in Aden – continues to be recognized by the UN and receives military and financial backing from Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) was alarmed at the prospect of Iran gaining a foothold on the Arabian Peninsula, and in 2015, with the civil war at its height, he intervened militarily.

He formed a coalition whose declared objective was to restore the internationally recognized Yemeni government and prevent the emergence of an Iranian-aligned regime on his country’s southern border.

Although a UN-brokered truce in 2022 substantially reduced cross-border fighting, it never resolved the underlying political conflict. The Houthis retained control of the capital and most of Yemen’s population centers in the northwest, while the recognized government retained international legitimacy but exercised authority over only part of the country.

Accordingly, from the Houthis’ perspective, Saudi Arabia remains not merely a regional rival but the principal foreign military supporter of its domestic enemy. Conversely, from Riyadh’s perspective, the Houthis are an armed insurgent movement backed by Iran that displaced Yemen’s legitimate government.

Most intelligence services and academic experts now reject earlier characterizations of the Houthis as merely “Iranian puppets.” They are now seen rather as partners with overlapping interests but independent agendas.

Iran provides support because the Houthis advance Tehran’s regional interests, while the Houthis, retaining significant autonomy in decision-making, accept support because it enhances their military and political position. Both sides derive substantial benefits.

Particularly since October 7, Iran has reportedly supplied the Houthis with missile and Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) technology, including training, intelligence, and financial support, and diplomatic backing.

The Houthis, meanwhile, provide Iran with pressure on Saudi Arabia and on Red Sea shipping, leverage against Israel, and a relatively inexpensive means of projecting regional influence.

Two possible developments might cause the mutually beneficial partnership to disintegrate. The first, and perhaps the more plausible, would be a decisive weakening or collapse of the Iranian regime following a renewed US military campaign, should a future Trump administration conclude that Tehran remained irredeemably hostile and that diplomatic options had been exhausted.

Such an outcome could deprive the Houthis of their principal source of advanced military technology, training, and political backing, forcing them to pursue a more independent course.

A second, less likely possibility would arise if sustained efforts by UN Special Envoy for Yemen Hans Grundberg succeeded in bringing the principal parties to the civil war into meaningful negotiations, securing a durable ceasefire and a comprehensive political settlement.

Were the Houthis to become stakeholders in a recognized governing arrangement, their incentives could shift toward economic reconstruction, international legitimacy, and stable regional relations, reducing the strategic value of close alignment with Iran.

For the moment, though, the liaison is firm, and the Houthis have become Iran’s only major proxy capable of exercising direct international pressure by threatening world oil supplies.

The writer, a former senior civil servant, is the Middle East correspondent for Eurasia Review. Follow him at: www.a-mid-east-journal.blogspot.com

This post was originally published on here. 

In the wake of a spate of cyberattacks against municipal water systems in multiple US states, suspected to have been perpetrated by Iran, US officials are pushing to pass legislation aimed at fixing security gaps that leave the infrastructure vulnerable to hacks. 

California Senator Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) water panel, and Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar on Monday unveiled the Water Cyber Shield Act, a bill intended to fortify drinking water and wastewater systems.

The proposed legislation follows numerous warnings from the EPA itself in addition to the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and Government Accountability Office (GAO).

On July 22, days before a suspected Iranian cyberattack targeted over 30 municipal water systems in multiple states, US government agencies updated an April advisory emphasizing the growing threat of Iran-affiliated hacks on internet-connected systems.

In the advisory, the FBI, CISA, and US National Security Agency (NSA) noted previous incidents in which cyber threat actors linked to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) similarly targeted US infrastructure, drawing a connection between the water systems hacks and earlier cyberattacks.

The FBI posited that Iran-affiliated cyberattacks increased, likely in response to ongoing hostilities between Washington and Tehran.

Cyberattack could tamper with drinking water, cause contamination

The consequences of a mass cyberattack on drinking and wastewater infrastructure could be significantly harmful to public health, according to a GAO report on the matter. If systems that monitor and control water treatment were tampered with by malicious actors, drinking water could be contaminated with unsafe levels of bacteria or chemicals.

Aging water infrastructure paired with a lack of federal cybersecurity oversight, according to Schiff and Klobuchar, exacerbate vulnerabilities in increasingly automated, internet-connected water systems.

The Water Cyber Shield Act, if passed, would expand the EPA’s authority to conduct cybersecurity assessments and mandate corrective action when cybersecurity gaps are found. 

It would also allow the EPA to establish enforceable baseline standards for the cybersecurity of drinking water and wastewater systems, with $300 million in funding allocated to bringing vulnerable systems into compliance with the standards.

Under the proposed bill, large drinking water and wastewater systems would additionally be required to integrate cybersecurity threats into their already existing risk and resilience planning.

EPA previously prevented from mandating cybersecurity measures

While the EPA is the federal body responsible for risk management in the water sector, it was previously prevented from mandating cybersecurity measures. 

In 2023, the EPA was forced to withdraw a memorandum addressing cybersecurity issues after multiple US states sued the agency, arguing that the EPA did not have the authority to enforce the proposed guidelines.

This post was originally published on here. 

The United States and Iran are nearing an agreement, Pakistani Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif told Bloomberg News in Islamabad on Tuesday.

“Things are shaping up again in favor of a peace arrangement or a deal,” Asif said. “The signals in the last two or three days are that we are close to some sort of an arrangement.”

Asif added that he believed that a long-term peace agreement would benefit the Middle East, according to Bloomberg.

This is a developing story.

This post was originally published on here. 

Damascus’s reported willingness to allow the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to remove nuclear material from the Assad-era “Site 99” underscores why Israel’s security arrangements must extend beyond the military sphere to the diplomatic arena, Dr. Gil Murciano told The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday.

Murciano, the CEO of Mitvim and an expert on Israeli foreign and security policy, spoke with the Post after Axios reported that the Trump administration had orchestrated a diplomatic agreement to see nuclear material removed without Israeli attacks on the site.

The material, said to be leftover parts of the Al-Kibar nuclear reactor project, has reportedly not yet been removed. Though not capable of producing nuclear weapons, Axios reported that it could have been used to make a “dirty bomb,” a radiological dispersal device (RDD) that combines conventional explosives with radioactive material.

A US official told Axios that Israel had threatened to bomb Site 99 if the material was not removed or if there was any indication that Damascus was trying to access the material, though sources claimed that few in Syria were even aware of its presence in the country.

Murciano said this was an example of why Israel should take a more active role in diplomacy, rather than relying exclusively on its military might and closest ally, Washington.

With Syria and Israel sharing many key security concerns, such as wanting to prevent the infiltration of Iran-aligned groups like Hezbollah, there is significant ground to hold discussions even if Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa’s background makes him a difficult figure to trust.

Jerusalem has remained cautious since the hostile but predictable Assad regime fell in 2024. Sharaa’s history as a wanted jihadist and former leader of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham did little to ease Israeli concerns when he rose to power, while sectarian attacks against Syria’s Druze, Alawite and Christian communities only fueled those fears.

“In Israel, we tend to look at Sharaa in an either-or, all-or-nothing way: either as the next great hope or as a jihadist in a suit, a kind of dichotomous perception of him as either a villain or a hero. I think that is a mistake,” Murciano explained, adding that it was becoming more essential for Israel to cooperate with regional actors and “shape” the new roles and relationships within the region as an active member.

Several int’l partners interested in ensuring nonproliferation in Syria

Far from suggesting Jerusalem should simply trust Damascus, Murciano said diplomacy could be based on shared goals and an understanding of what the other party is interested in, which in the case of Sharaa is legitimacy. With that in mind, he said it was not surprising that Damascus would be willing to hand over the materials, although Jerusalem reportedly feared that Ankara was encouraging Damascus to retain the remnants.

Beyond Damascus, there are a number of potential international partners who would be interested in ensuring nonproliferation in Syria, especially given the scale of chemical weapons manufactured and utilized by the Assad regime.  

“The issue of non-proliferation is a very interesting topic that could be one of the topics that would enable Israel to join forces with other like-minded partners, even in some cases sides that are not in the greatest relationship right now with Israel,” he continued.

Still in the crucial transitional phase, he said, now is the time for Israel to shape the relationships and norms that will help solidify the future security of its northern border. That relationship could either remain a hostile calm reliant on foreign actors to contain tensions, or develop into an active dialogue through which Jerusalem can translate military achievements into long-term strategic gains, something critics have argued Israel has failed to do throughout the multiple wars of the past three years.

“If any withdrawal from Syrian territory is seen as completely off the table for political reasons by this government, then you are going to be in the passive role again. Instead of taking the initiative, you are going to respond to the lesser evil, and you are going to be the one responding to a reality that is being imposed upon you,” he warned. “That is exactly what happened to us in Lebanon, and that is exactly what is happening to us in Syria. Political considerations are preventing us from taking an initiative that is crucial to preserving Israel’s national security. Right now, all we can offer is the military aspect. We have completely failed to offer any form of political initiative, and national security cannot be served by these issues alone.”

Operation Bashan Arrow

Operation Bashan Arrow was a major achievement for the IDF, enabling it to destroy around 80% of Syria’s Assad-era strategic military capabilities. However, Murciano said that at some point, a political next step would be necessary. He argued that Israel’s continued military presence in Syria, intended to create a buffer zone, was instead fueling actions against Israel and causing long-term damage to relations with a neighboring state that is not going anywhere.

Reports of clashes between US President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have periodically highlighted Washington’s frustration with what it sees as Jerusalem’s lack of flexibility and an excessive reliance on military solutions to security threats.

In June, Axios reported that Trump had confronted Netanyahu over strikes in Lebanon which had threatened the US’s talks with Iran.  “Everybody hates Israel because of this,” Trump reportedly told Netanyahu at the time.

Murciano said that Netanyahu’s government had “lost control” over decision-making on Iran, Syria and Lebanon as a result of its “hawkish approach” and “its inability to offer anything on the political level, rejecting every initiative.”

“I’m not saying that we should accept every initiative brought to us on Syria, but we need to address them. We need to provide our reservations and offer our own initiatives, because this is already happening with us or without us,” he concluded. “The ship has already sailed.”

This post was originally published on here. 

Israeli international soccer player Manor Solomon has signed with London-based club West Ham United for a reported £5 million (NIS 20,287,150) fee, the English Championship club announced on Monday evening.

Solomon, 27, has now joined his fourth English club following his permanent departure from Premier League outfit Tottenham Hotspur, also known as Spurs, where he failed to break into the first team despite the club’s recent struggles.

Manor is a Hammer ⚒️ pic.twitter.com/ox4uZJ0X3i

— West Ham United (@WestHam) August 10, 2026

“I’m really happy to be here, happy to be a Hammer, and I can’t wait to get started,” Solomon was quoted by West Ham as saying. “I’ll try to give my all in the first season and then in the seasons ahead. I want to be here for a long time and I want to make the fans really happy.”

Solomon is primarily a left winger known for his pace, dribbling ability, and attacking movement. By joining West Ham, Solomon follows in the footsteps of former Israeli soccer stars Eyal Berkovic and Yossi Benayoun, who both enjoyed successful spells in London in the late 1990s and early 2000s, respectively. 

Other former Israeli players who played for West Ham include defender Tal Ben-Haim and attacker Yaniv Katan.

A message from Manor 📩 pic.twitter.com/XDgC5t22fN

— West Ham United (@WestHam) August 10, 2026

Solomon extends his wide-ranging soccer career across Europe

Solomon has played 49 times for Israel’s national team so far in his career, scoring eight senior goals in the process. After breaking through at Maccabi Petah Tikva, he began his European career at Ukrainian side Shakhtar Donetsk, where he won three Ukrainian league championships before signing a five-year deal with Spurs in July 2023.

During his time with Spurs, Solomon joined several teams across Europe on loan, including Spanish side Villarreal and Italian side Fiorentina. He also spent time on loan at English sides Fulham and Leeds United, the latter of which was where he won the Championship – the same league in which he will now compete with West Ham.

He spent the second half of the previous season in Florence, where he scored two goals in 16 league appearances. That season, West Ham were relegated from England’s top flight and will now look to return to the Premier League with Solomon.

This post was originally published on here. 

A rocket attack hit a training camp for the Iranian-Kurdish opposition northeast of the Iraqi city of Erbil on Tuesday, said security sources who blamed Iran for the assault.

No casualties were reported, the sources said.

This is a developing story.

This post was originally published on here. 

In an emotional homecoming, former hostage Sagui Dekel-Chen performed a special concert on Monday night on the central lawn of Kibbutz Nir Oz, the community from which he was abducted during the October 7 attacks.

The Israel Festival event, titled “From Captivity to the Lawn: Stories and Songs,” drew 3,000 attendees, including bereaved families and other former captives. The concert marked the first public debut of nine songs Dekel-Chen authored, composed, and mentally cataloged throughout his 498 days of captivity in the Gaza Strip.

Flanked by a live band and joined by prominent Israeli artists – including Idan Raichel, Marina Maximilian, and the band Hatikva 6 – Dekel-Chen detailed the psychological role music played during his confinement.

“In captivity, the music I knew kept playing in my head,” Dekel-Chen told the audience. “Initially, it served as a sedative. Later, it became a weapon to maintain sanity.”

Dekel-Chen described nightly routines where he held imaginary conversations and storytelling sessions with his daughters. Morning routines involved pacing the corner of his cell while visualizing dancing with his wife to tracks by Israeli singer Rita.

Former hostage’s music juxtaposes trauma with hope

The debut material captures a stark juxtaposition between trauma and domestic hope.

In “Song of Songs,” Dekel-Chen sings, “We used to sing at the top of our lungs, now I sing in silence.” Another piece, “Don’t Know Your Name Yet,” is dedicated to his youngest daughter, who was born while he was in Gaza.

In “The Song for Me,” Dekel-Chen articulates his psychological struggles post-release, noting that while he fears nightmares and lingering trauma, his primary fear was “returning to an empty house.”

During the performance, Dekel-Chen recounted the events of October 7, detailing his engagement with the kibbutz civilian response team, his wound, and his abduction. He admitted that because he witnessed explosions and gunfire at his residence during his capture, he spent nearly his entire captivity believing his family had been killed.

To survive, Dekel-Chen said he deliberately maintained a falsehood in his own mind that his children were alive. When informed by captors on February 12, 2025, that he was scheduled for release within three days, he ceased the self-deception and began mathematically planning funerals for his daughters, assuming the worst. Upon his release, he discovered his family had survived.

Musical event not escapism, but trauma-processing, director says

Kibbutz Nir Oz suffered severe casualties and abductions during the October 7 attack. The concert’s artistic director, Itay Mautner, rejected the notion that the musical event was a form of escapism, framing it instead as an essential, public processing of ongoing regional trauma.

Speaking after the event, Prof. Jonathan Dekel-Chen, Sagui’s father and a professional historian, characterized the concert as dual-purpose.

“On one hand, it is a prayer of gratitude that Sagui returned on his own two feet,” he said. “On the other, it is a prayer for everything that was lost here in Nir Oz. The grief, the loss, and the difficulty of the abandonment remain with us forever.”

This post was originally published on here. 

The IDF and Border Police officers destroyed the home of the terrorist who killed Maj. Yuval Ezra, 27, and Capt. (res.) Benayahu Mellet, 32, in an overnight operation in the village of Tell in the West Bank, the military announced on Tuesday afternoon.

Soldiers from the IDF’s Samaria Brigade, Yahalom Combat Engineers, and officers from the Border Police’s Judea and Samaria Brigade took part in the operation.

Ezra and Mellet were killed during the July 24 West Bank attack near Gilad Farm, a settlement located southwest of Nablus.

Mellet was a member of Gilad Farm’s local emergency response squad and served in the reserves in regional defense. Ezra was an Artillery Corps battery commander who had returned to reinforce the sector after the military raised its level of readiness.

Command failures led to Yuval Ezra, Benayahu Mellet’s deaths in West Bank attacks

Last week, the IDF published the findings of its investigation into the military’s response to the attack and found significant operational and command failures.

The investigation found that the soldiers and local security personnel who entered the confrontation acted courageously and prevented further casualties but reached a rapidly expanding violent incident with insufficient forces, an incomplete understanding of what was happening, and serious failures in command and medical evacuation.

Four Palestinians from the Ramadan family were also killed during the confrontation near the village of Tell, southwest of Nablus.

The IDF said Palestinian attackers were killed in the exchange, but the findings released last week did not detail the individual role of each of the four or explain the circumstances in which each was shot.

The probe, published nearly two weeks after the incident, was presented to IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Eyal Zamir by Central Command chief Maj.-Gen. Avi Bluth and Judea and Samaria Division commander Brig.-Gen. Kobi Heller.

Sarah Ben-Nun and James Genn contributed to this report.

This post was originally published on here. 

Two settlers damaged a Palestinian family’s property, disconnected their electricity system, and emptied their water tank after trespassing on their residential compound on Tuesday.

This comes after an order barring Israeli “protective presence activists,” who work to protect Palestinian residents within the West Bank, from around the town of Taiba, near Ramallah. 

Activists called the police on behalf of the mother of the family. 

Nationalist crime in West Bank rises

Data released by the Israeli security establishment on Monday revealed a significant 63% increase in nationalist crime in the West Bank during the first half of 2026 compared to the same period in the previous year, Israel’s public broadcaster, KAN News, reported.

In total, some 660 incidents were recorded in the first half of 2026, up from 405 in the second half of 2025 and 440 in the first half of 2025.

The report also indicated that the number of deliberate attacks against security forces rose significantly, with 45 incidents reported in the first half of 2026, compared to 30 in the second half of 2025, marking a 50% increase in violence directed at security personnel.

Shoshana Baker contributed to this report. 

This post was originally published on here. 

Rescue efforts across western Colombia carried into a second day on Tuesday as emergency workers dug through collapsed buildings and flattened homes, amid expectations that the death toll from the country’s most powerful earthquake in decades could rise.

The 7.4-magnitude earthquake tore through Colombia‘s coffee-growing heartland early on Monday, killing at least 164 people.

The quake reduced multi-story buildings to rubble in cities such as Pereira and Cali, and cracked apart one of the towers of a historic cathedral in the city of Manizales.

Emergency teams aided by police, soldiers and volunteers worked through the night with excavators and, at times, their bare hands, hunting for survivors beneath debris.

In Cali, home to about 2.2 million people, at least 85 people were killed. Dozens of buildings were left leaning precariously or destroyed outright, forcing residents into the streets.

Cali hospital floors collapse, patients trapped inside

Several of the top floors of one of the city’s hospitals – some dedicated to pediatric care – collapsed upon themselves, leaving some patients trapped and forcing some 600 others to be tended to on a street strewn with rubble, hospital director Irne Torres Castro told Caracol television.

Carmen Yasmin Garcia, 43, a Cali resident volunteering with rescue teams, said on Monday afternoon that her group had freed seven people from a collapsed building, but four others and a dog remained trapped.

“A moment ago there was scratching, but now we can’t hear anything; we still have faith that the dog is alive and we can get these people out,” Garcia said. “We need people with sticks and spades; the more people lending a hand, the better.”

In Pereira, capital of the hard-hit state of Risaralda, authorities reported 66 dead.

The city also bore some of the most visible destruction, with entire residential blocks reduced to piles of concrete and twisted steel. Video posted on social media and verified by Reuters showed the city’s airport violently swaying during the quake, with large chunks of the ceiling collapsing as people sheltered.

Another 13 people died in Choco, the rural province closest to the quake’s epicenter.

Colombian president to deploy security force members after looting reports

Colombian President Abelardo De La Espriella, who assumed power just days ago, said 35 people died in Cali alone, while 188 were missing. He said 1,000 members of the security forces would be deployed to the city by dawn, following reports of looting. Cali, as well as Pereira, implemented curfews on Monday night.

“Our intention is to cooperate in any way necessary. Here, there are no distinctions or ideological divisions when it comes to defending our people or showing solidarity,” De La Espriella told journalists on Monday evening.

The disaster has drawn comparisons to a deadly 1999 earthquake that devastated the same coffee-growing region, killing more than 1,000 people, as well as to catastrophic quakes that killed more than 6,300 in neighboring Venezuela in June.

This post was originally published on here. 

Israeli-Arab activist Yoseph Haddad was involved in a physical altercation with California Congressional candidate Dennis Feitosa on Monday after being challenged while filming the podcast “Digital Social Hour.”

In a video later released on social media, Feitosa can be seen grabbing at Haddad’s hand as Haddad gestures while speaking as the two fought verbally.

“You kill children. F*** off you genocidal f***ing freak. You genocidal f***ing freak,” Feitosa can be heard saying as Haddad taunts him, saying “you can’t do s***, my brother.”

Haddad then pulled Feitosa forward by the hand, knocking their heads together before the two were forced apart.

I was attacked by a groyper in the U.S… he just didn’t realize he had picked a Golani soldier!
I came today to take part in a filmed debate against a group of anti-Israel activists, with the person debating me constantly changing. At one point, a man who was clearly a groyper… pic.twitter.com/Tk1s0tlbmB

— יוסף חדאד – Yoseph Haddad (@YosephHaddad) August 11, 2026

Haddad, Feitosa engage in physical altercation outside

The video then showed the two outside, apparently prepared to fight each other. In one angle, Haddad seemed to have picked several rocks up in his hand to use. An apparent member of Feitosa’s entourage approached Haddad’s wife, asking her repeatedly if Haddad was her husband as she tried to block the camera he was holding.

The video then showed Haddad walking away, paper in one hand, phone in the other, while a man attempted to hold Feitosa back.

“Be a man,” called Feitosa.

“I wasn’t planning on fighting you anyway,” Haddad said before Feitosa came up behind him and put him into a headlock. Two others pulled Feitosa off and to the ground before Haddad hit him.

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For Fauda fans from around the world, the suspense is over, or rather, it’s about to begin: Netflix announced Monday it will show the fifth season of the acclaimed Israeli series around the world beginning on September 8.

The fifth season of this series about an Israeli counterterrorism unit aired in Israel on Yes starting in May. But with the September 8 Netflix release, viewers in 190 countries will be able to see the new episodes, which are in Arabic, Hebrew, French, and English, with subtitles in their native languages.

The series, co-created by Avi Issacharoff and Lior Raz and starring Raz, debuted in 2015 in Israel. It was picked up by Netflix and became a worldwide sensation, hitting the coveted Netflix top 10 charts all over, including in Arab countries. In Lebanon, the fourth season hit the number one spot in January 2023.

It also reached the Netflix top 10 in Jordan, Qatar, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates in early 2023. Reportedly, Fauda is something of a guilty pleasure for Palestinian audiences in the West Bank and even in Gaza, who enjoy seeing the many Palestinian characters.

Fauda’s creators had much of the fifth season written by the fall of 2023, but scrapped these scripts following the Hamas massacre in Israel on October 7, 2023, which led to the outbreak of war. Raz and Issacharof have said in interviews that they needed to incorporate the new reality into the series.

Fauda devotes two episodes to Oct. 7 massacre

In the fifth season, two episodes are devoted to the massacre, and feature violence so graphic that they were shown with warnings in Israel that advised audiences that they could skip the episodes, which came in the middle of the season, if they were afraid that they might be too upsetting.

Yes also took the unusual step of making the episodes available for free online, for those who felt they needed to see them.

Speaking to Deadline, Issacharoff said, “This is a TV show, not reality. But we thought that there is still a story here to be told. We wanted to ask very tough questions to people all over the world, not only in Israel. Is the revenge worth it? Is continuing this very endless cycle of bloodshed worth it? Where is it taking you? I think these are the questions that are at the heart of this season.”

Cast joined by Melanie Laurent

In addition to Raz, the fifth season stars the original cast members, Doron Ben-David and Yaakov Zada-Daniel, who are joined by French star Melanie Laurent, who played the heroine of Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds. Much of the early season five episodes are set in Marseille.

Fauda is still available on Yes VOD in Israel. 

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Two young Israelis visiting Montenegro appear to have been targeted by a group of people for being Jewish during a pre-army vacation, N12 reported on Monday.

The two Israelis, Yoav and Dor, told N12 that they were visiting a casino when a man approached them, made conversation, and then asked where they were from.

After the two said they were from Israel, “our nightmare began,” Yoav recounted.

“The guy wouldn’t leave us, started pestering us, and offered to take us to a ‘much nicer casino.’ At the beginning of the conversation with him, he said he was on a family vacation, but then we saw that he knew all the locals sitting at the tables around him. That’s when we started to get suspicious and realize that something was wrong.”

The two were able to escape the man and exit the casino, only to be confronted by a group of around 15 people.

“It felt like a planned ambush in every regard. They were waiting for us, they noticed us and chased us. A hunt began in the alleys and streets.”

Yoav and Dor split up, with Yoav finding a hiding place in a private garden, where he was able to call his parents.

“I heard them right on top of me, searching house by house, shouting ‘Jews, Jews!'” Yoav said. “After a few minutes, I managed to sneak into the outside kitchen of another house, where I called my parents.”

Dor, meanwhile, had run down the main road, where he was caught and kicked by the pursuing mob.

“Miraculously and with his last strength, he managed to escape them and get away until he reached the hotel,” Yoav described to N12. “I hid outside for two and a half hours.”

Israelis aided by Foreign Ministry after antisemitic attack

After Yoav made contact with his parents, they were able to contact the Foreign Ministry.

“They were amazing and made sure to take care of the children and help them as soon as we found out about the incident,” Yoav’s mother said. 

“The director of the department for Israelis abroad at the Foreign Ministry and the Israeli consulate in Serbia, which is responsible for the Montenegro sector, called the police, who accompanied the children and were in contact with us throughout the entire incident, which took place at night, and also afterward.”

An investigation by Montenegro authorities is ongoing, N12 noted.

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The Likud Secretariat is expected to be asked to approve the placement of Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, Defense Minister Israel Katz, and Likud Central Committee Chairman and Minister Haim Katz on the party’s Knesset list on Tuesday, alongside the new reserved slots that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to add to the list.

“The Likud Secretariat will be asked to approve, alongside the prime minister’s reserved slots, the placement of Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, Defense Minister Israel Katz, and party Central Committee Chairman Minister Haim Katz on the Likud list, in addition to the new candidates the prime minister is expected to reserve,” Likud said in a statement. 

The party said that the defense minister, “who in any case was expected to reach the top of the list, should be given a reserved slot in order to allow him to deal with security needs and not engage in politics at this time.”

Sa’ar, on the other hand, will be placed on the Likud list as part of the unification agreement between his party and Likud, while Haim Katz will be placed on the list due to his position as chairman of the party’s Central Committee, the statement said. 

First slot given to Dobronsky

The development comes after Netanyahu’s first reserved candidate for the Likud list was announced on Monday night: Oren Dobronsky, a businessman and panelist on Channel 12’s “Shark Tank” program. 

Netanyahu welcomed Dobronsky to the party, and Likud said that after the elections, he is expected to lead the field of artificial intelligence in the economy and the public sector, including in education, medicine, and the economy.

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The Israeli Embassy in Vienna has lost contact with two Israelis, the Foreign Ministry announced on Tuesday afternoon. 

Mali and Liel Yahalomi, an Israeli mother and daughter, have been missing since Friday.

The two should immediately reach out to their family, the embassy’s emergency hotline at +436763672304, or the local police, the embassy said in a Facebook post.

This is a developing story. 

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MK Dan Illouz announced on Tuesday that he was resigning from the Knesset after leaving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party for MK Avigdor Liberman’s Yisrael Beytenu.

In a post to X/Twitter announcing the resignation, Ilouz said he resigned after the dissolution of the Knesset to prevent “adding another vote in favor of the draft evasion laws promoted by Netanyahu, [United Torah Judaism Chair Yitzhak] Goldknopf, and [Shas Chair Arye] Deri.”

Illouz has been a vocal critic of the contentious haredi-backed legislation advanced by Netanyahu’s coalition, which critics argued would encourage draft evasion amid the IDF’s severe manpower shortage.

“As long as I served in the Knesset, I acted to block this legislation, which contradicts Likud’s declared values, and to stand by the principles I believe in,” Illouz wrote. “Principles that Likud promised to uphold, but apparently did not promise to carry out.”

“Netanyahu failed and did not take responsibility. He must go home.”

Illouz will be replaced in the Knesset by the next person on Likud’s list, Shabtai Katash, a haredi (ultra-Orthodox) member of Lod’s Religious Council.

The resignation comes while the Knesset is in recess ahead of elections and does not convene for plenum sessions to pass legislation unless under special circumstances.

Illouz joins Yisrael Beytenu after Likud departure

Last week, Illouz announced he would be joining Yisrael Beytenu and endorsing party chairman MK Avigdor Liberman for prime minister.

He left Likud last month, saying he could not remain a member of a party he could no longer bring himself to vote for.

“Netanyahu has failed in leading the country, and he must take responsibility and go home,” Illouz stated at the time.

Sharply criticizing the Likud, Illouz said the party had become “a subcontractor” for haredi party leaders (Shas) and Goldknopf.

“I call on all Likud voters: Anyone who wants a genuine right-wing party should vote for Yisrael Beytenu,” Illouz said.

Yisrael Beytenu is a core party in the opposition bloc seeking to replace Netanyahu in the upcoming elections. It holds a hardline stance regarding haredi conscription to the IDF.

The party also holds a hawkish security stance and advocates for expanding Israeli settlements in the West Bank. It strongly advocates for a separation of religion and state.

Keshet Neev contributed to this report.

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Zionist Home–The Reservists, founded in July, is one of many vying for citizens’ votes in the elections for the 26th Knesset, which will be held on October 27.

Led by former Blue and White members and ex-ministers Chili Tropper and Yoaz Hendel, the party is the evolution of Hendel’s The Reservists. Despite Tropper being listed first on the list, the two announced that they would lead the party as equal partners.

The party has not identified itself as Left or Right, but has aligned itself with center/Right-leaning policies.

Former culture and sports minister Tropper and former communications minister Hendel may find themselves in the role of potential kingmakers in the upcoming election, as the two have expressed a willingness to sit on either side of the aisle and may hold the seats that can make or break a coalition.

According to recent polling, the party is hovering around the electoral threshold and, if it succeeds in passing, would enter the Knesset with around four seats, the minimum provided to a party.

Tropper and Hendel have stated their aim is to create a “broad Zionist government,” and will not join a coalition with haredi (ultra-Orthodox) or Arab parties.

“Netanyahu is not my red line. My red line is what kind of ideology the government represents, whether it is a Zionist government,” Hendel previously told The Jerusalem Post.

“Let me put it this way: I can say one thing very clearly: a 61-seat government for Netanyahu will not happen, because that means sitting with the ultra-Orthodox parties, not passing a conscription law, and not accepting responsibility for the war.”

Additionally, the two stated they would demand Hendel be made National Security Minister in order to join any coalition, due to his security background and “proven record as a government minister with significant achievements.”

Where Zionist Home–The Reservists stands on the major issues

This is a party that only formally merged and launched its campaign last month, so its platform, billed the Star of David Plan, covers seven declared core areas: education, equal service, cost of living, settlements, checks and balances, governance, and border-community rehabilitation.

The party has not yet detailed public positions on many issues, such as foreign affairs or Iran, but is known to hold a hawkish, right-wing stance.

Before the party’s conception, Hendel made statements in support of relocating roughly 1.5 million Gaza residents into Israeli territory and a separate proposal for a tent city outside the Strip as a means to defeat Hamas, but the party has yet to state its formal position on the terrorist group or Gaza as a whole.

On the topic of a two-state solution, the current party position is in support of Israeli settlements.

“We will not allow a Palestinian state to be established, and we support a free economy,” Hendel told the Post.

“In Judea and Samaria, we must control the high ground and ensure there is settlement… we support settlement and want to ensure that we are present everywhere and strong on the ground,” he added.

The party was founded on Zionist principles and a push for equal service for all, with serious consequences for draft dodgers. The party also pledged to provide benefits for those who serve, as well as enforce sanctions for draft evaders.

Under the party’s education plan, public funding would only be provided to schools that teach core curriculum studies.

What a vote for this party is likely to produce

A vote for The Zionist Home–The Reservists is likely a vote to support an attempt at building a “broad Zionist government,” as many opposition party members have expressed is their goal, including Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar, Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid’s B’Yachad, Yair Golan’s Democrats, and Avigdor Liberman’s Yisrael Beytenu.

While Tropper and Hendel have not explicitly ruled out a partnership with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, they have stated they would only do so for a government free of haredi coalition partners with a draft law already passed, a scenario Netanyahu has so far avoided.

However, the party’s largely central views and lack of public commitments mean it would be difficult to definitively determine which bloc leader it would follow.

Parties running for Knesset are required to submit finalized party lists to the Central Elections Committee by September 9, meaning there is still time for a potential merger between Tropper and Hendel with an additional party.

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Former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad was convicted of premeditated murder of multiple people, including children, torture, arbitrary detention, and crimes against humanity, and was sentenced to death on Tuesday, Syria’s official news agency SANA confirmed.

Assad fled Damascus in December 2024 and has been living in the Moscow area since.

He was tried in absentia.

This is a developing story.

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Is one of the biggest deals in European basketball history, and Israeli basketball in particular, drawing near?

About two weeks after reports of interest from Hapoel Tel Aviv were denied, reports in the US on Monday night indicated that contacts between the Reds and Russell Westbrook are continuing and even progressing.

Journalist Marc Jacobs posted on X (formerly Twitter) that discussions between the parties “continue to advance,” and if the deal is completed, it will be the former MVP’s first club outside the US. As recalled, according to The Athletic, the star is seriously considering a first career move outside the NBA.

The 37-year-old Westbrook is still a free agent after completing the previous NBA season. Over his career, he won the league’s MVP award, was selected to nine All-Star games, and is considered one of the greatest point guards of his generation. He also holds the all-time NBA record for triple-doubles and was included in the league’s 75th Anniversary Team.

Two weeks ago, Hapoel Tel Aviv was already linked to the star, alongside Panathinaikos and Dubai, though sources close to the club denied the interest at the time. Now, at least according to the American report, the picture has changed, and the possibility of seeing Westbrook in Europe appears more real than ever.

If he indeed signs in Israel, it would be one of the biggest signings ever seen in European basketball. However, at this stage, no agreement between the sides has been reported, but rather advanced negotiations and the fact that the player is seriously considering opening a new chapter in his career away from the NBA.

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An undercover investigation conducted over the past several months went public on Sunday after a couple from Bat Yam were arrested on the suspicion of posing as insurance company representatives and defrauding at least 75 people.

According to police, most of Periel Ben-David and Sahar Shmuel Abutbul’s victims are Arabs.

During the conversations, they provided victims with personal information before claiming that money owed to them was being held by the insurance company and that they could help them withdraw it.

In exchange for their services, the couple allegedly demanded a “fee” ranging from NIS 2,000 to NIS 5,000, and in some cases up to NIS 10,000.

The victims were then asked to provide a code allowing cash to be withdrawn from an ATM without a card. Police suspect the codes were used to withdraw the money, after which contact with the victims was cut off.

Ten phones seized, police searching for additional victims

During the search, police seized 10 different phones and believe that information stored on them could lead to the identification of additional victims beyond the 75 already linked to the case.

Ben-David is suspected of obtaining something by fraud under aggravated circumstances, impersonation with intent to defraud, conspiracy to commit a felony, invasion of privacy, and processing personal information from a database without authorization.

She is also suspected of possessing or using drugs not for personal consumption. Police suspect the couple acted together as part of the alleged fraud scheme.

Ben-David exercised her right to remain silent during questioning, a police representative said at the hearing. Her partner, Abutbul, denied the allegations against him during his initial questioning.

During the hearing, Ben-David’s attorney raised allegations regarding the conduct of police officers at the time of her arrest.

According to the attorney, she was told that “if you cooperate, you’ll get off lightly, you have children at home, we know about the six-month-old baby who recently underwent surgery at Wolfson.”

The defense attorney then asked the police representative to explain why the statement had been made.

They asked for their client to be released to house arrest at her father’s home, citing, among other factors, the baby’s condition following the surgery. They also argued that Ben-David was not the person who went to the ATMs and physically withdrew the money.

Detention extended by nine days

Police, however, requested that her detention be extended by nine days.

Judge Zivon Alimi ruled that there was reasonable suspicion against Ben-David and that releasing her at this stage could interfere with the investigation.

At the conclusion of the hearings, the court ordered that the couple remain in custody until August 12.

Police are continuing to examine the seized material and determine whether there are additional victims. Ben-David’s attorney is also expected to file an appeal with the Central District Court in Lod on Tuesday seeking her release.

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Likud MK Tally Gotliv on Tuesday condemned the party’s decision to ask the party secretariat to approve the placement of Defense Minister Israel Katz as one of the reserved slots on the party list.

“Israel Katz, the man and the privilege – the man and the season – the man who was terribly afraid of the primaries’ results, and rightly so, is receiving a reserved slot in the Likud party,” Gotliv posted on X/Twitter.

The decision, Gotliv wrote, was a “despicable step that mocks Likud voters, who understand one thing better than all the veteran ministers combined, and that is the necessity to fight the judicial junta that is persecuting the right-wing government and the people of the right.”

“As the saying goes in Katz‘s primary video: ‘Boom boom boom,'” Gotliv added.

Likud defends Katz’s inclusion in Knesset list

The party said that the defense minister, “who in any case was expected to reach the top of the list, should be given a reserved slot in order to allow him to deal with security needs and not engage in politics at this time.”

Other ministers whom the secretariat is expected to be asked to approve include Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar and party Central Committee Chairman Minister Haim Katz.

Nachum Perry contributed to this report.

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