All News (Page 94)

Israeli defense exports to Europe are breaking records, but the latest deal with Greece, worth euro 3.5 billion, also has a strategic dimension.

While the “Arrow 3” deal with Germany was seen primarily as a response to the war in Ukraine, the latest procurement by Greece reflects the development of a regional alliance against Turkey.

Greece will procure a multi-layered air defense system from Israel for around euro 3.5 billion, which will be integrated into its Achilles Shield defense system. The procurement will include Rafael’s David’s Sling in the upper layer, Israel Aerospace Industries’ Barak MX in the middle layer, and Rafael’s Spyder system in the lower layer.

Turkey, under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, threatens Greece no less than it does Israel, creating a triangular alliance that is also tightening with Cyprus.

Greece’s challenge and the need for deterrence

Turkey and Greece might be NATO allies, but they have chronic tensions over the boundaries of their economic waters in the eastern Mediterranean and the Aegean Sea.

Since 1995, the Turkish maritime law has been casting a cloud over relations, according to which if Greece expands its economic waters in the Aegean Sea beyond six nautical miles, Ankara will see the move as a pretext for war. This year, the trend intensified with Turkey’s promotion of the “Blue Homeland” law, under which Ankara aims to extend its territorial waters by more nautical miles at the expense of Greece’s economic waters.

According to spokespeople for the Erdogan regime, the law was supposed to have already been enacted but has stalled for now. A senior Greek official told Globes that the assessment in Athens is that the Turkish government has not abandoned the idea but has postponed it until after the US midterm elections. “This is a worrying step,” the official admitted.

Turkish policy also indirectly harms Israel. About a year ago, the Greeks decided to ignore Ankara’s threats and declared a closed maritime zone off the islands of Kasos and Karpathos to begin laying a cable to connect the Israeli electricity grid to Europe. An Italian ship has already arrived at the deployment site but has not begun working, because the Turks have threatened to cut the cables and Greece has chosen to avoid a unilateral move for fear of a direct military confrontation.

Now, the Turks have declared a closed maritime zone for seismic research being conducted north of Cyprus between July 20 and August 30. The goal: to lay a natural gas pipeline between Turkey and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (KKTC), a puppet entity whose independence only Ankara recognizes. The move illustrates how close Turkish buildup and displays of power are getting to Israel.

“Turkey is eight times bigger than us,” Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said in an interview with local media after Greece’s National Security Council approved the deal. “We are ready to discuss a realistic solution to issues such as the exclusive economic zone, but I will never be ready to conduct diplomacy from a position of weakness. I want Greece to always maintain a strong warning capability.”

The path to that deterrence lies in a multi-layered air defense system to be provided by Israel, and, according to the plan, will be fully deployed in just 35 months. The project is being accelerated because of Greece’s threat perception, which fears a Turkish opening strike with multiple missiles and rockets in an attempt to conquer islands in the Aegean Sea. The Greek ambition is that the Israeli multi-layered system will allow for the minimization of vulnerabilities and provide breathing space for the deployment of forces from Greece to the islands.

David’s Sling will be part of a national system and is therefore expected to be located on mainland Greece. Barak MX will also be deployed throughout mainland Greece and possibly even on the main islands, and Spyder’s versatility will be utilized to deploy batteries on the Aegean islands as far as Crete.

David’s Sling system has a range of up to 300 kilometers and is capable of intercepting cruise missiles, aircraft, and drones. The Barak MX system supports various radars and launchers for coverage against fighter jets, helicopters, drones, cruise missiles, surface-to-air missiles, and surface-to-surface missiles. The Spyder system, which was recently sold to Romania in a euro 2 billion deal, provides air defense solutions at different ranges and against a variety of threats, including UAVs, aircraft, helicopters, and short-range ballistic missiles.

Israel will transfer knowledge and capabilities, including source code

Greek magazine HellasJournal reported that a crucial detail in the creation of the Achilles Shield is the command-and-control system, including the provision of source code for Greek independence. According to the same report, the unified air defense network will be managed from this system, in which, alongside the Israeli systems, US-made systems already in Greece will be integrated, such as the Patriot and Hawk. The magazine also reported that Greek production of interceptors for the Israeli systems is possible.

From here, Israel and Greece will soon work out details for the operational side of the agreement, which includes at least 25% local production. The issue of local production has become a major issue worldwide in recent years, due to the realization that many years of neglect of defense budgets has also led to a substantial gap in technological knowledge and industrial capabilities.

Greece, for example, is consistently increasing its defense budget. After standing at about $7.4 billion in 2023 (about 2.9% of GDP), it is estimated at about $8.6 billion this year (about 3.5% of GDP). The Achilles Shield program is just one pillar of a $28 billion defense investment plan to upgrade Greek military capabilities by 2036.

To meet Greek requirements for the transfer of capabilities and knowledge, optimal coordination will be required between the Ministry of Defense, IAI, and Rafael. The success of the transfer of knowledge to Greece is strategic for the Defense Ministry in two aspects: business and securing supply chains.

While Defense Ministry director general Maj.-Gen. (Res.) Amir Baram is managing negotiations to extend the US aid agreement beyond 2028 and transform it into a long-term cooperation framework, he is also working to diversify sources of production and supply, especially of critical components.

Thus, knowledge and production transfers guarantee steady income for the defense industries, and when the need arises, Israel will be able to regulate supplies from factories in other countries, without them being threatened. For example, the ministry’s activities with India – the main customer of the defense industries – which also has a close relationship with Iran, making it unlikely to be attacked.

This post was originally published on here. 

Boy George has just released what may well be the most pro-Israel, pro-Jewish song ever by a mainstream recording artist, “We Will Dance Again,” which he posted on his social media accounts, with the hashtag, “Shalom.”

The phrase, “We Will Dance Again,” has become a motto that symbolizes renewal and recovery following the October 7, 2023 attack by Hamas that left 1200 dead, about 364 of them concertgoers at the Supernova Music Festival, where the dancing was interrupted by rockets and then murder. Around 40 were kidnapped that day from the festival, some of whom were killed in captivity, while others were held in Gaza for over two years.

The Instagram account by the 80s pop icon, best known as the frontman of the group Culture Club, has the Hebrew words for“We Will Dance Again” written alongside the English.

The song features a reggae beat similar to the style of some of Culture Club’s songs, and launches right into the song’s message, addressing the inflammatory language that has been used to attack Jews and Israelis for nearly three years: “You say genocide, I say war/When you’re attacked, it’s what the army is for/Does it get ugly?/You bet it does/When you want to kill every last one of us.”

‘If you’re ever confused, I stand with the Jews’

The chorus of the song makes crystal clear sentiments that Boy George has expressed before in interviews and on social media: “But trust me, we will dance again, and there will be no war….But if you’re ever confused, I stand with the Jews/I don’t feel brave, I just need to behave like a human.”

Early on in the song, he revisits the horrors of the massacre, saying, “You never mention October 7/Young girls raped against trees/Murdered brutally for the crime of dancing.” He also attacks those in the music world who condemn Israel but never Hamas, saying, “You condemn the Jews with selective memory/Musicians holding flags mouthing like sheep/Propaganda fueled by the internet/Feels so weak.”

He finishes by singing the opening lines in Hebrew.

Boy George standing with the Jewish people

It’s not the first time that Boy George demonstrated his affinity for Israel and the Jewish people. In the video for the Culture Club song “Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?”, he wore a shirt that read “Tarbut Aguda” in Hebrew letters, which translates roughly to “culture association.” Many Israelis loved seeing Hebrew in a popular music video and embraced the song, the singer, and the band.

Boy George, whose real name is George Alan O’Dowd, has performed in Israel several times, both as a solo artist and with Culture Club. In 2024, he was among over 400 artists and celebrities who signed an open letter in support of Israel’s participation in the Eurovision Song Contest.

In 2020, he collaborated with Israeli musician Asaf Goren on the song “Rainbow in the Dark,” which has English and Hebrew lyrics.

While many online expressed their hate for him – a typical comment on X read “F*** off genocide apologist,” others had words of praise. “You are a ray of light in great darkness,” wrote @tlvboy82 on Instagram. Many posted pictures from the Supernova Festival and the memorial there, and expressed hope that Boy George would perform again in Israel.

This post was originally published on here. 

Former Likud minister and Reservists Party Chairman Yoaz Hendel told 103FM on Monday that Bezalel Smotrich’s Religious Zionist Party leadership is abandoning Zionist values and enabling mass draft evasion, one day after the party held its primaries.

In an interview with Amichai Atali and Ilil Shahar, Hendel sharply criticized the party’s leaders for prioritizing their partnership with the haredi parties. He also outlined his vision for a broad Zionist government that would not depend on either haredi or Arab parties.

“This is a list whose leaders have never experienced the army in their lives,” Hendel said. “They never stood eight hours on, eight hours off in a pillbox, at a post or in a defensive position, and that is the truth. The most painful truth is that, at the moment of truth, during wartime, they chose to support the haredi parties and political operatives.”

According to Hendel, that support was reflected in the distribution of government positions and the transfer of budgets that encourage avoidance of military service. He also criticized legislation advanced by the coalition, which he described as “a draft-evasion law and a law that disgraces the Torah.”

“In politics, apparently, everything is permitted, but in the moral, ethical and Jewish world, it cannot be that someone who calls himself ‘Religious Zionism’ encourages mass draft evasion,” he said. “The Religious Zionist Party, the party, not the admirable community, is causing a catastrophe and a disgrace during wartime. They support anti-Zionist legislation and are preventing us from winning the war.”

A Zionist government without haredi or Arab parties

Hendel, who said he had completed more than 560 days of reserve duty, argued that Zionist values were not limited to settlement in the West Bank.

Zionism, he said, also meant “settlement in Kiryat Shmona, in the North, in the Gaza border communities and in the Jordan Valley,” alongside a commitment to prevent reservists from across the country from being “ground down for hundreds of days.”

He warned that continued political dependence on the haredi parties could eventually damage the fabric of life in Israel.

“We will reach a situation in which there is a non-Zionist majority, and we will break apart into autonomous regions,” he said.

Hendel later presented his party’s platform, emphasizing that it combines right-wing positions on settlement and the judicial system with a demand for shared national service.

“We support settlement, reforms to the judicial system and, at the same time, enlistment in the army,” he said. “The most basic thing is that every Israeli citizen, Jewish, Arab, haredi (ultra-Orthodox), secular, left-wing or right-wing, should do something for his country.”

Hendel also criticized the involvement of elected officials who do not serve in the military in decisions concerning wartime operations.

“It does not seem reasonable to me that Goldknopf sits there and makes decisions about whether I will risk my life, when he does not know what it means to fear a phone call in the middle of the night,” he said.

Asked about the political deadlock reflected in opinion polls and the difficulty of forming a coalition without the Likud under Netanyahu or without Arab parties, Hendel rejected renewed reliance on Ra’am, despite having previously served in a government in which the party was a coalition partner.

“In the government I saw up close with Mansour Abbas, the moment a military operation began, Ra’am suspended its participation in the coalition for several days,” he said. “I do not think a coalition can be formed with non-Zionist parties, Arab or haredi. It did not work, it does not work during wartime, and it will not work.”

Hendel was equally unequivocal regarding Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“Netanyahu needs to go home,” he said.

According to Hendel, the way out of Israel’s political impasse is to create a new Zionist political force capable of holding the balance of power.

“We are the solution to the reality in which we are stuck, and we will recommend a candidate for prime minister who can bring together as many Zionist mandates as possible,” he concluded. “Without us, we will reach another stalemate, because that is what happened in the last five elections.”

This post was originally published on here. 

The Australian Jewish Association (AJA) has told Australia’s Royal Commission into Antisemitism that government rhetoric, Islamist extremism, and coordinated “lawfare” campaigns have fundamentally altered Jewish life in Australia.

In a 32-page submission shared with The Jerusalem Post, the group says that many Australian Jews are now considering making aliyah because they no longer feel confident in the country’s future. The submission comes just weeks after former AJA president Dr. David Adler announced he had moved to Israel, citing rising antisemitism and security fears as reasons.

The central focus of the submission is that Jewish life in Australia has fundamentally changed, and not for the better.

One noticeable change is the unprecedented increase in visible security at Jewish events. AJA notes that this has become so commonplace at Jewish events that many members of the community now feel uncomfortable attending events that do not have visible security arrangements in place.

AJA has never received any government funding for security expenses and, therefore, incurs significant costs to keep its members safe.

Political concerns and fears of public backlash result in venue cancellations

AJA also noted that, for security reasons, the locations of AJA events are not publicly advertised, and addresses are provided only to registered attendees after they have been vetted and, in many cases, only shortly before the event.

While these arrangements are necessary, AJA said they create significant logistical difficulties and are unlike the arrangements required for any other community in Australia. On several occasions, details of AJA events have been leaked, resulting in pressure being placed on venues not to proceed with bookings, the submission adds.

Because of political concerns and the fears of public backlash, many venues are unwilling to host Jewish events, AJA said. Recently, the Queensland Cricketers’ Club declined a booking request from AJA to host an event discussing antisemitism featuring British author Melanie Phillips. The venue cited concerns that hosting the event could be perceived as controversial and could attract negative publicity.

AJA said these experiences demonstrate that antisemitism affects not only individual Jewish Australians but also the ability of Jewish organizations to conduct normal community activities. “Security concerns, venue reluctance, secrecy requirements, and event disruptions have become a routine part of Jewish communal life in Australia,” it said.

Effects of ‘lawfare’

Another aspect of Jewish life that has changed is the increasing use of lawfare.

This relatively new phenomenon has become commonplace since October 7, 2023. “Lawfare” refers to the strategic use of legal, regulatory, and administrative processes to intimidate opponents, disrupt organizations, impose costs, consume resources, or achieve political objectives.

AJA said it has observed a significant increase in complaints, investigations, and regulatory actions initiated in connection with Jewish advocacy and pro-Israel activity. Complaints connected to AJA’s communal and advocacy work have been lodged with bodies as diverse as a local council, medical regulator, anti-discrimination agency, and the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission (ACNC).

It said these complaints are designed to burden Jewish organizations and their representatives with time-consuming and resource-intensive processes.

A notable example involves Australian Jewish Association Tzedakah (AJAT), a charity focused on combating antisemitism.

Anti-Israel activists launched a coordinated campaign seeking to have AJAT’s Deductible Gift Recipient (DGR) status revoked. The campaign involved repeated complaints to the ACNC and other authorities and sought to portray AJAT and AJA as a single organization despite them being separate entities with distinct legal structures and purposes.

It is important to note that, regardless of the outcome of such complaints, the process itself imposes significant costs on Jewish organizations.

AJA itself has been targeted by such techniques. Since October 7, it has received approximately a dozen legal threats, including several Concerns Notices issued by the same law firm.

There were dozens of complaints lodged with the NSW Health Care Complaints Commission (HCCC) in 2024 and 2025 against Adler. None related to clinical care but rather to his work on behalf of AJA and the Jewish community.

AJA CEO Robert Gregory was similarly unsuccessfully targeted following his appointment by Waverley Council to its Multicultural Advisory Committee.

While the complaints rarely succeed, “their cumulative effect should not be underestimated,” said the AJA.

“They consume significant time and resources, impose personal stress on those targeted, and risk discouraging Jewish Australians from participating in public life, community leadership, and democratic debate.

“AJA submits that the strategic use of complaints processes against Jewish organizations and community representatives is an emerging issue that warrants careful consideration by the Royal Commission.”

Threats of violence

Of course, there is also significant discussion of threats within the submission.

One such threat against Gregory and Adler resulted in the first arrest by the Australian Federal Police’s Special Operation Avalite task force, which was established to combat antisemitism.

The threat – a message with a picture of a noose and the words “if you dare show up at the Senate committee, you will all die” – was made on the eve of their appearance before a Senate hearing examining proposed misinformation laws. The offender was subsequently convicted and sentenced.

Underneath a post announcing that Gregory had become a father to a baby girl, someone wrote, “Until we Aussies inevitably put all your genocidal kind in next-gen gas chambers.”

On occasions, authorities have failed to investigate threats against AJA.

Gregory told the Post that AFP recently decided to not take action after AJA reported an emailed threat to firebomb its office, which referred to “filthy f***ing Jews.”The email read: “Hey, what’s up? Hope you guys have a wonderful day, and I hope mine is as wonderful when your f***ing offices get firebombed, you filthy f***ing Jews.”

Gregory alerted the AFP the same day. The AFP responded to the AJA two days later, saying the email did not qualify as a direct threat and was not offensive enough to reach the threshold for an offense. An AFP Counter Terrorism Command detective sergeant emailed: “I understand you consider the email as offensive and menacing towards you and your office. However, unfortunately, the comment is unlikely to reach the offense (threshold).”

The AFP has now reversed its decision and has since opened an investigation.

Governmental failures

On the subject of law enforcement, the submission also sheds light on governmental failures that have led to the proliferation of antisemitism in Australia. “A series of decisions and public statements by the Albanese government contributed to an environment in which antisemitism flourished, and Australian Jews felt increasingly isolated and unsupported,” the submission reads.

AJA noted that the election of the Albanese government ushered in a period in which Australia-Israel relations deteriorated significantly and antisemitism in Australia reached unprecedented levels.

Prior to the 2022 election, AJA publicly warned that the election of Labor would have consequences for the Jewish community.

In October 2022, as Australian Jews gathered to celebrate Simchat Torah, the Albanese government announced the reversal of Australia’s recognition of parts of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. The decision reportedly came without warning to Jewish communal leaders and triggered a difficult period for the Australian Jewish community.

Over the following months and years, the government altered longstanding bipartisan voting patterns at the United Nations and increased funding to UNRWA. Following the October 7 massacre, many world leaders traveled to Israel to express solidarity with the victims and their families. Leaders from the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and Germany all made visits. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese did not.

AJA also noted concerning statements by government ministers and double standards in the form of sanctioning Israeli ministers while not sanctioning Islamist extremist figures. These actions have led to condemnation even from Australia’s own former prime minister Scott Morrison.

“It is no coincidence that the first Australian government since the creation of the State of Israel to abandon bipartisan policies toward the Jewish state also oversaw the largest surge in anti-Jewish hatred in Australian history,” testified the AJA.

As a result of all of the above, the AJA said it is aware of a growing number of Australian Jews who are actively considering leaving Australia because of rising antisemitism. “These decisions are not being driven by economic hardship or a lack of opportunity. Rather, they reflect growing concerns about the long-term future of Jewish life in Australia and the safety of future generations,” AJA said.

It noted that many of those considering aliyah are highly educated, professionally successful, and active contributors to Australian society, whose departure would represent a loss not only to the Jewish community but to Australia more broadly.

“It is a sad indictment on Australia that many feel safer moving to a country currently fighting a multi-front war,” AJA concluded.

This post was originally published on here. 

Hundreds of demonstrators and community leaders converged on New York City’s Upper West Side on Sunday for a “United Against Hate” rally organized by the #EndJewHatred movement. The protest targeted New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, holding city leadership accountable for rising crime and accusing the administration of fostering a dangerous climate for minority communities.

The demonstration was organized in the wake of two violent stabbing attacks that occurred days earlier on Thursday afternoon on the Upper West Side. The suspect, identified by police as 51-year-old Raul Morales, allegedly shouted “Allahu Akbar” while targeting two separate victims blocks apart: 50-year-old Moshe Yezhak Grunhaus, a Jewish man stabbed outside his synagogue near Amsterdam Avenue and West 86th Street, and Chok Sung, a 57-year-old Asian man stabbed near West 84th Street and Central Park West.

Later that day, Morales was arrested and charged with attempted murder and assault as hate crimes after being found barricaded inside a nearby NYC Housing Authority building.

The demonstration organizers and speakers argued that the violence was the direct result of mainstreamed rhetoric targeting Israel and Jewish residents.

This friction was compounded by recent controversy surrounding Mamdani’s announcement that his administration had reviewed avenues to arrest Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on behalf of the International Criminal Court should he visit New York for the United Nations General Assembly in September, a move that ultimately concluded he could not legally arrest the prime minister, though he urged activists to protest him.

Speakers and attendees at the rally denounced the mayor and local policies, claiming that public safety has eroded under soft-on-crime legislation and inflammatory political discourse. Protesters carried signs and chanted slogans, demanding accountability and structural changes.

‘Remove Mamdani, Arrest Mamdani’

Demonstrators chanted, “Remove Mamdani,” “Arrest Mamdani,” and “Zohran, Zohran, you can hide. We charge you with hate and crime.” Posters featuring an image of the mayor with blood on his hands were displayed at the event.

#EndJewHatred also noted that over 300 family members of 9/11 victims and more than 12,000 signatories have signed a petition urging Mamdani not to attend the 25th anniversary memorial at Ground Zero due to his rhetoric regarding Islamist extremism.

#EndJewHatred Director Michelle Ahdoot addressed the crowd, stating, “We’re here because Mayor Mamdani has blood on his hands,” and adding that his obsessive focus against Western ideology and Israel is inciting violence.

Assembly Member Michael Novakhov announced at the rally that he is formally calling on the US Department of Justice to open a civil rights investigation into New York City, New York State, and Mamdani, declaring that Jewish New Yorkers should not have to hide their identities.

Moshe Spern, a history teacher with the United Jewish Teachers advocacy group, remarked that hatred never stops with its first target, arguing that rhetoric framing Israeli leaders as “war criminals” helped create the climate that led to the Upper West Side stabbings.

‘Mamdani is throwing gasoline on the fire’ said Rabbi Weiss

Rabbi Avi Weiss told the crowd, “A mayor of the city of New York is supposed to bring our communities together. You, Mamdani, are throwing gasoline on the fire, pitting one community against the other after that vile video. You’ve placed a target on the back of each and every one of us, including that attack on the west side.”

Another protester, when asked why she was there, told Newsmax, “I feel like we have to stand up for the United States of America, and I don’t want it to get so far gone that we’re like, ‘Why was I silent?’ We can’t be silent. This man is a danger. He is a charismatic man, we got to give him that, and he’s appealing to people that are not naturally born Americans, people that don’t really have a connection to this country. I think Jewish people are part of the fabric of our country. I’m Catholic, and I believe that our country is first and foremost in everything we do.”

Across the street from the main demonstration, a smaller contingent of anti-Zionist Orthodox Jewish members, associated with groups like Neturei Karta, held a counter-protest, defending the mayor. Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss, of Jews United Against Zionism, told CBS News New York in a live interview at the rally that “They’re against Jews because of what the Zionists are doing, and they think that the Jews are responsible. He is doing a job to clarify that it’s not Judaism. He is doing the Jews a favor.”

Tensions boiled as protesters and counter-protesters clashed verbally and competed for space while police officers attempted to manage the crowds and keep the sidewalks clear. Amidst the shouting matches, police officers stood physically between the opposing factions to maintain order.

After being asked to respond by CBS reporter Ali Bowman to the backlash on Sunday during the Dominican Parade in the Bronx, Mamdani stated, “There’s no tolerance for antisemitism in this city. We have to root out antisemitism from across the five boroughs, and that’s because this is a city that has no room for hate or bigotry of any kind. And when we make criticisms of a nation-state or policies, we have to remember that those are criticisms of exactly that, never of a people, never of a faith.”

This post was originally published on here. 

Twelve torah scrolls were stolen on Sunday night from the Grand Synagogue of Levallois (ACCIL) on the outskirts of Paris, the synagogue’s rabbi and the Jewish Community Protection Service (SPCJ) confirmed Monday.

According to initial reports, two individuals broke into the building and stole the scrolls. This occurred despite the premises being protected by cameras and extensive surveillance systems.

Rabbi Chalom Lellouche said he discovered the theft on Monday morning while preparing to host a bar mitzvah. As soon as he reported it, SPCJ conducted a thorough search of the premises and then called the police. The investigation is ongoing.

“It was with shock and anger that I learned this morning that the Jewish community of Levallois had been struck at what is most sacred and precious to it,” said Levallois Mayor Agnès Pottier-Dumas.

She said the municipal and national police were immediately notified and have been working on the case since this morning.

A ‘clearly criminal act’ but also antisemitic

“Whatever the motives of those who committed this sacrilegious act, which has profoundly shaken the Jewish community to its core, the antisemitic nature of this despicable crime must be denounced,” she said, noting that the Torah alone was targeted, and that more expensive objects of non-religious value were left untouched.

“We also hope that these sacred scrolls, whose value is beyond measure, can be recovered. And for those who believe, we stand united in prayer with the Jewish community, wounded by this heinous act.”

Rabbi Chalom Lellouche and Philippe Cohen, President of ACCIL Levallois, released a joint video denouncing the severity of the incident.

“It was clearly a criminal act, but also an antisemitic one,” the men said.

They also noted that the assailants were clearly professionals, having successfully skirted the walls and evaded the security systems.

“This is a spiritual trauma for all the Jewish community of France, and indeed across the world,” added Chellouche and Cohen. 

This post was originally published on here. 

The High Court of Justice should temporarily freeze a law separating the Justice Ministry’s Police Investigation Department from the State Attorney’s Office, Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara argued on Monday, warning that it would create a “political prosecution unit” capable of intimidating police officers, investigators, prosecutors and journalists.

This is a developing story. 

This post was originally published on here. 

At least one shot was fired outside the US consulate in downtown Toronto early on Monday, but there were no injuries, police said, in what was the second such incident in the last four months.

Police officers, alerted by the sound of a gunshot, said they found evidence of a weapon having been fired outside the building on University Avenue.

In a post on X, police said a white sedan was seen fleeing the scene, adding no injuries were reported, they said.

A Reuters reporter on the scene said police had sealed off the immediate area.

Multiple incidents of shootings in Toronto

On March 10, several shots were fired at the same building. The incident followed three separate incidents in which gunshots were fired at synagogues in the Toronto area.

In June, police said, without providing any more details, that young people in the Toronto area were being paid to shoot at various targets, including synagogues, Jewish schools, and the US Consulate.

This post was originally published on here. 

Security forces arrested nine suspects in overnight raids across the West Bank, including the father of the Palestinian terrorist who carried out Friday’s deadly shooting near Gilad Farm, Israel Police said Monday.

Police did not say what the father was suspected of and did not allege that he was involved in the attack itself. He was transferred for questioning.

Three other wanted suspects were arrested in the Balata refugee camp in Nablus in an undercover Border Police operation directed by the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency).

Police said the three were suspected of involvement in terrorist activity but provided no further details and did not say whether they were believed to have any connection to Friday’s attack. They were transferred to the Shin Bet for questioning.

In separate operations in Tal near Nablus, Ramallah, Shuweika near Tulkarm and Bani Naim near Hebron, Border Police arrested six additional suspects, including the attacker’s father.

Charges include incitement to terrorism, rioting, smuggling

Police said those arrests concerned suspicions of incitement to terrorism, rioting, smuggling Palestinians without permits into Israel and other offenses. 

Maj. Yuval Ezra, 27, an artillery battery commander, and Sgt.-Maj. (res.) Benyahu Mellet, 32, a member of Gilad Farm’s local security team, were killed in the Friday shooting.

The attack began after a group of Israeli hikers entered Palestinian Authority-controlled territory near the village of Tal and clashed with local Palestinians. According to the IDF, a Palestinian attacker seized a security officer’s rifle and opened fire at the Israelis. He was killed at the scene.

This post was originally published on here. 

Yashar Party leader Gadi Eisenkot is facing criticism from Cypriot politician and member of the European Parliament, Fidias Panayiotou, over a billboard campaign in Cyprus.

Panayiotou took to X/Twitter on Sunday to express his concerns about the billboards.

He stated, “This photo was not taken in Israel, but in my country, Cyprus. This time it is political propaganda, but it is also becoming increasingly common to see billboards advertising real estate in Hebrew across the island.” 

Panayiotou concluded, “This is simply not right. We must defend Cyprus’s sovereignty.”

This photo was not taken in Israel, but in my country, Cyprus.

This time is political propaganda, but it is also becoming increasingly common to see billboards advertising real estate in Hebrew across the island.

This is simply not right. We must defend Cyprus’s sovereignty. pic.twitter.com/wGTBjC1Qaw

— Fidias Panayiotou (@Fidias0) July 26, 2026

Israel’s elections are slated for October 27.

The ad campaign consists of a series of billboards located around the airport, making them visible to both arriving and departing travelers. The billboards read: “Israelis, enjoy! You deserve it,” accompanied by Eisenkot’s photo.

Eisenkot’s office informed The Jerusalem Post that the campaign is expected to expand into other countries throughout the summer. They emphasized that the initiative aims to convey a positive message to Israelis about achieving victory in the elections.

This is a developing story.

This post was originally published on here. 

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir told 103FM on Monday that he had ruled out another joint election run with Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s Religious Zionist Party, arguing that the two parties appeal to fundamentally different electorates.

The Otzma Yehudit leader expanded by telling 103FM the reasons why he believes the two parties should run separately in the next election.

“The difference between the public that votes for them and the public that votes for me is like heaven and earth. They are a sub-sector within religious Zionism. It is important, and I love that sector, but they are national-religious voters with what is called a very, very specific orientation. That is not all national-religious voters. They appeal to a sector within religious Zionism; I appeal to all the people of Israel. I am everyone’s Itamar,” Ben-Gvir said.

“I belong to everyone. I belong to secular Israelis, traditional Israelis, Masuda from Sderot, Moshe from Kiryat Shmona and Greenbaum from Ramat Aviv.”

“First of all, Smotrich is a very smart politician and a very talented minister. He truly deserves a great deal of credit for what he has done for the settlement movement, but he appeals to a very, very specific sector,” Ben-Gvir said regarding his partner in the government. 

Ben-Gvir warns against broad unity government

Ben-Gvir said there was also a practical reason for opposing another merger between the parties.

“Sometimes these things clash. The problem is that one plus one does not always equal two. I want there to be a right-wing government, and for there to be a right-wing government, sometimes one party weakens the other,” he said. “I appeal to everyone. I appeal to the South, the North, the periphery and the haredim. I appeal to everyone,” he said.

“The boundaries I set are very, very clear,” he said. “I want a government whose character is very, very clear, a right-wing government that acts rather than one that is paralyzed,” he added.

Ben-Gvir also addressed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent remarks that he would seek to establish as broad a government as possible.

“I am honestly a little concerned about Netanyahu’s drive for a unity government with Eisenkot and Bennett,” he said. “It is a drive that I do not understand. After all, if he truly wants to pursue judicial reform, dismiss the attorney-general and do all sorts of things like that, how will he do it with Eisenkot?”

Ben-Gvir explained why he opposed cooperation with the proposed Peace Council in Gaza and discussed his political power and standing.

“Throughout the past year, I opposed what was happening in Gaza,” he said. “The decision in Gaza must involve encouraging emigration. There can be no cooperation with Hamas, and foreign forces cannot be relied upon. Even those who believed in those things need to look at reality.

“Hamas is not disarming. It is only trying to rebuild itself. Under these circumstances, I told my colleagues, ‘I do not understand how we can talk about a Board of Peace. With Hamas, you speak only through the crosshairs.’

“I say this is the wrong step. People will have an opportunity in the next election. If I have not six seats but 12 or 15, my power will be much greater.”

Ben-Gvir further said, “I think I influenced Netanyahu a great deal over the past two and a half years on many issues. Things he did not dare to do in the past, or perhaps dreamed of doing, he did. I do not know whether that was because of Itamar Ben-Gvir.

“My presence in the security cabinet and the fact that I lead a hard-line approach do have an impact,” he said.

Later in the interview, Ben-Gvir described what he said was the change that had taken place in Israeli prisons.

“It is time you understood that while you are snickering, the terrorists wet themselves at night,” he said. “It is time you understood that this contemptuous talk about ‘pitas and crocodiles’ is what we dismissed throughout the state’s 78 years of existence.”

“It reached the point where you would enter an Israeli security prison and find a terrorist playing ping-pong. Next to him was a large refrigerator full of meat, beside that was a lawn, and there was a store with 20 kinds of shampoo,” he added.

“The entire concept was that it paid to be a terrorist. Then Itamar Ben-Gvir came along. He was not an army general and was not an officer, and now there is no one, including the head of the Shin Bet, who does not come to me and tell me, ‘You deserve the Israel Prize for what you did in the prisons,’” he said.

This post was originally published on here. 

Hezbollah and Iran took advantage of a gap in Lebanon’s education system to create schools that can indoctrinate the next generation of martyrs and elite in their cause, according to a new report by Col. (ret.) Dr. Jacques Neriah published in the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs.

Although Shiite religious leaders and political figures launched several initiatives to address the educational disadvantages experienced by Lebanon’s Shiite community during the Ottoman and French Mandate periods, significant changes in Shiite education accelerated during the second half of the 20th century.

Earlier efforts included the establishment of modern religious and social institutions, as well as the spread of secular ideologies such as Marxism among segments of the community. However, many Shiite communities, particularly in rural areas, continued to rely on traditional religious scholarship, where basic literacy and Islamic studies remained central.

The 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran ultimately shaped Shiite educational networks in Lebanon into pro-Hezbollah and pro-Iran institutions of radicalization.

Hezbollah and Iran’s investment in education began early in the movement’s history.

Islamic Republic contributed funds towards construction of schools, institutions

Former Hezbollah Secretary-General Sayyid Abbas al-Musawi, before the terror group was founded, established the Imam al-Muntazar Hawza for Islamic Studies in Baalbek in 1979, with direct support from Grand Ayatollah Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr in Iraq and the Islamic Republic.

The opening ceremony was attended by the Iranian ambassador in Damascus, and it was announced that the Islamic Republic contributed $35,000 and 10,000 Syrian liras toward the construction of the hawza.

Schools for the Shiite community operating outside of the state system began opening more rapidly in Lebanon’s South after the fall of the Pahlavi Dynasty and the 1982 Lebanon War, which largely disrupted the secular left, the report noted. The Islamic Revolutionary Guards were quick to take advantage of the situation.

Throughout the 1980s, Iranian funding was channeled to Shiite religious schools, alongside rhetoric surrounding “Hezbollah’s students” and “Educational Mobilization.” By 1987, there were 198 schools benefiting from Iranian funds in West Beirut and the suburbs.

Mobilization schools were specifically created to prepare the ground for a coup against the Lebanese state, according to the report, and students were prepared both with the skills needed for the modern economy and the ideology to further Hezbollah’s interests.

The Al-Mahdi and Al-Mustafa schools were later credited by the now-assassinated Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah for shaping the next generation of terrorists.

“We will continue expanding and developing these schools horizontally, vertically, and geographically, as they are deeply tied to our faith and jihadist mission,” he said during an address commemorating the anniversary of the opening of the Al-Mahdi schools.

Sheikh Naim Qassem, the current secretary-general of Hezbollah, was notably one of the founders of the Al-Mustafa school network. He has written that the school’s educational objective is to “create an identity linking knowledge, jihad, education, and faith in service of the resistance, the homeland, and the nation, as preparation for the Imam Mahdi state.”

The Hezbollah-affiliated “Schools of the Islamic Foundation for Education and the Islamic Religious Education Association” adapted programs that promoted images of Ayatollah Ruhollah Mostafavi Khomeini and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as role models. The schools also ensured that lessons were taught to raise a generation of Hezbollah loyalists.

Even as of 2026, the report noted that Hezbollah is estimated to oversee at least 22 schools and 47,000 students, with far more under affiliated networks.

The Al-Mustafa schools are specifically designed to target the Shiite middle and upper-middle class, as well as the children of senior party officials, to produce the next generation of the group’s elite to represent Hezbollah in the professional sphere, the report claimed. Directed by the Islamic Religious Education Association, the schools aim to compete with the state curriculum while offering an “Islamic alternative” under the direct supervision of Hezbollah leaders such as Sheikh Naim Qassem.

Al-Mahdi network consists of 17 schools, generates Hezbollah adherents

The Al-Mahdi network, which operates under Hezbollah’s Executive Council’s education unit, is made up of at least 17 schools, including both elementary and high schools. These schools focus on mobilizing the next generation of Hezbollah, emphasizing the ideas of self-sacrifice and martyrdom, according to the report.

“These institutions are designed to transform the Shiite community into a disciplined, ideologically uniform base, ensuring that the party’s survival is anchored in the minds of the next generation,” Neriah assessed. “Hezbollah views education not merely as a social service or an academic pursuit, but as a primary pillar of societal engineering and the building of what they term a resistance society (mujtama’ al-muqawama).”

Both Al-Mahdi and Al-Mustafa schools are heavily subsidized, allowing them to meet the legal requirements of the state while maintaining their “parallel curriculum” designed for ideological and religious indoctrination, the report continued. This allows students to be taught the concept of Wilayat al-Faqih (Guardianship of the Jurist), which gives the Islamic regime ultimate authority.

From as young as five, children’s physical activities in the schools mimic military training and operations. The report insisted that while standard schools shield children from violence, Hezbollah’s network actively seeks to normalize it.

Hezbollah’s Imam al-Mahdi Scouts are also used to bolster the idea of jihad, making the transition from school to the terror field more practical, the report continued. The estimated 100,000 children in the club wear Hezbollah military uniforms, and successful scouts are recruited into Hezbollah’s actual military at as young as 16.

In these schools, the report noted that textbooks and classroom activities normalize and glorify martyrdom, “resistance,” and hatred toward Israel and the West. The Mahdi Magazine, given to children aged 4-17, further strengthens these lessons taught in class with comics featuring stories of armed struggle.

The Lebanese national anthem is rarely heard, with the song “Salam Ya Mahdi” taking its place, a hymn that pledges allegiance to the Shiite Iranian cause. Sung daily, Neriah assessed that this was done to further separate children from their Lebanese identity. 

This post was originally published on here. 

A rare Judean Pillar Figurine mold dating to the First Temple period was recently found during archaeological excavations in the Old City of Jerusalem, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) announced on Monday morning.

It is the first mold ever found in Israel to produce such figures dating to the First Temple period.

The mold, used in antiquity to cast the face of a female figurine, was found within the Tower of David Museum during excavations ahead of construction of the new Schulich Wing for Archaeology, Art and Innovation.

Following its discovery, the mold was handed over to Tamar Gonen, a ceramics conservation and restoration specialist at the IAA, who successfully cleaned the artifact and revealed its inner design of finely crafted facial features.

Afterward, it was passed on to conservation and restoration specialist Sviatoslav Klindukhov, who created a cast from an appropriate material. 

The result was a full reconstruction of the face of a female figurine, displaying clearly defined features and an elaborate curly hairstyle.

Three types of First Temple figurines 

Three prominent types of First Temple figurines have been found: female figurines, commonly known as Judean Pillar Figurines; those depicting a horse and its rider; and zoomorphic (animal) figurines, primarily representing horses.

Made of clay, these figurines are often between approximately 10 and 20 centimeters high. They are typically covered in a white coating, though surviving traces of pigment indicate they were originally painted in yellow, red, and black.

When discovered, these clay figurines are often found broken at the neck – a result of the manufacturing technique, in which the head and body were made separately by hand, while only the face was formed using a mold.

“The mold was discovered while sifting soil removed from fills and accumulations dating to the First Temple period,” explained IAA Excavation Directors Dr. Amit Re’em and Dr. Ayala Zilberstein. “The Kishle excavation, which has been ongoing for several years, continues to surprise us time and again.”

“[The mold] is one of the most significant archaeological excavations conducted in Jerusalem in recent decades, presenting the city’s history in a clear and continuous sequence, from the days of the Kings of Judah, through the many periods that shaped Jerusalem, and up to the British Mandate.”

Re’em added that clay figurines from the First Temple period have been found in almost every excavation conducted in Jerusalem and the surrounding area. 

“Until now, however, no production molds for these figurines had ever been discovered in Jerusalem,” Re’em said. “This raised the question of whether they were manufactured locally or imported from elsewhere. The discovery of this mold at the Kishle is therefore the first of its kind in Jerusalem, providing direct evidence that at least some of these figurines were produced within the city itself.”

According to IAA Iron Age Curator Debbi Ben-Ami, the function of the Judean Pillar Figurines has not yet been fully understood. 

“The fact that they have been found in almost every household, as well as in streets and tombs, indicates that they were objects of everyday use,” she said, noting that the identity and purpose of the Judean Pillar Figurines remains the subject of scholarly debate. 

Ben-Ami explained that several interpretations of the statues have been proposed by scholars, including that they are the representation of a fertility goddess, such as Asherah, the ancient Northwest Semitic goddess believed to have been the wife of El or Yahweh. 

Other scholars have suggested that the figurines might have been children’s toys, she added.

A third possibility for the statues’ purpose may have been that they served as “blessing figures,” household amulets intended to bring protection and good fortune, Ben-Ami said.

“We hope that the newly discovered mold from Jerusalem will provide fresh insights and help answer some of the questions that continue to occupy researchers.”

Tower of David Jerusalem Museum Director and Chief Curator Eilat Lieber said that “the discovery of the first mold for producing figurines dating to the First Temple period has generated tremendous excitement among all of us.”

Tying Jerusalem’s past, present together

“The Tower of David Jerusalem Museum is built on the idea that Jerusalem’s past continues to shape its present,” Lieber said. “This summer, visitors will have the extraordinary opportunity to take part in real archaeological research by sifting soil from the Kishle excavations.”

“Every fragment recovered helps illuminate another chapter in the story of Jerusalem, making participants true partners in preserving and revealing the city’s remarkable heritage.”

Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu added that according to the Jewish sages, the First Temple was “destroyed because of three principal sins: idolatry, sexual immorality, and bloodshed.”

“The discovery of a mold for producing figurines from the First Temple period in the heart of Jerusalem offers us a tangible glimpse into the world in which the prophets of Israel lived and into the spiritual and cultural realities they confronted,” he said. “When such an artifact emerges from the soil of Jerusalem, history becomes real and immediate: this small piece of pottery tells the story of the beliefs, customs, and spiritual challenges that characterized the capital city in ancient times.”

The Schulich Foundation, one of Canada’s largest foundations, proudly supports education, healthcare, arts and culture.

This post was originally published on here. 

Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa laid out a strategic vision for Syria and the region in recent comments in an interview.

Speaking with Qatar’s Al Jazeera, he described Syria’s attempts to manage tensions with Israel while also dealing with Lebanon and Iraq. He also discussed internal issues, such as the Kurdish minority in Syria and how Damascus positions itself in a changing world order.

According to Syrian state media SANA, “Sharaa said Syria is pursuing a foreign policy centered on reconstruction, stability, and balanced relations with regional and international powers, while reaffirming Syria’s support for Lebanese state sovereignty, a future security arrangement with Israel that preserves Syria’s rights, and continued economic opening following the lifting of US sanctions.”

A key part of this concept is that Syria should balance relations with the major powers. Sharaa met US President Donald Trump earlier this month on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Turkey.

He has also met with Russia and European countries in the past and recently hosted the head of the UN in Syria.

Sharaa: Syria is working to reach a security arrangement with Israel

“The president said Syria’s relations with the United States have improved following his visit to the White House and Washington’s decision to lift sanctions, describing the development as the beginning of a positive new phase in bilateral ties,” SANA noted.

Sharaa also said that “Syria had also received a positive response from European countries, Russia, and China,” adding that “Damascus had successfully conveyed its new political vision to the international community.”

Russia was a backer of Bashar al-Assad. However, Russia also has a naval base in Syria and has important ties to the country going back more than 50 years.

“On Russia, President al-Sharaa said contacts began during Syria’s liberation and resulted in an agreement to limit Russia’s military presence at Hmeimim Air Base and part of the Tartous naval facility, while discussions over the future of those bases remain ongoing,” SANA noted.

Syria will work to preserve ties with Moscow while also developing warmer relations with the US. Syria has sought to remain outside the Lebanese quagmire, although it once had troops in Lebanon from 1976 to 2005.

The US has indicated it would support Syria fighting Hezbollah, but Sharaa has so far been unwilling to do so.

“President al-Sharaa said Syria supports the Lebanese state’s exclusive authority over weapons, stressing that decades of armed groups operating outside state institutions had produced ‘catastrophic consequences,’” Sharaa said.

His statement comes after Lebanon’s President Joseph Aoun met Trump. Trump also met Iraq’s Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi this month, illustrating how the US is working closely with Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq.

SANA also noted that the Syrian leader discussed Israel.

“Regarding Israel, the president said Syria is working to reach a security arrangement by engaging multiple countries to increase diplomatic pressure on Israel aimed at reducing tensions and preventing further conflict.”

Tensions in southern Syria as IDF operates in Golan region

In recent days, there have been more tensions in southern Syria, where the IDF operates in Syrian villages near the Golan. Syrian media reports on almost daily tensions in Quneitra and Dara’a provinces.

Syrian civilians continue to be angry that they must deal with tensions with the IDF rather than have the Syrian government present in their villages.

SANA added that Sharaa said, “if such a [security] agreement is achieved and respected by Israel, he said, it could create the conditions for a second stage in a comprehensive peace without compromising Syria’s right to the occupied Golan.”

Syria wants to pursue an independent regional policy. As such, Sharaa is saying that Syria has a strategy. He will pursue investment in the country and try to balance various agendas and avoid conflicts.

He also discussed the integration of the Syrian Democratic Forces, the mostly Kurdish force that existed in eastern Syria, into the new Syrian army. There are concerns of instability in central Syria and potential clashes between Arab tribes and Kurdish forces. Damascus wants to make sure integration goes smoothly.

SANA noted that “in northeastern Syria, the president said the government distinguishes between the Kurdish community and the Syrian Democratic Forces, noting that the government had granted broader citizenship and cultural rights to Kurds while reaching an agreement with the SDF after lengthy negotiations.”

This post was originally published on here. 

The Knesset told the High Court of Justice that Israel’s new judicial-selection system should not be struck down simply because the justices may consider the existing system better, arguing that only severe damage to the country’s democratic character could justify invalidating part of a Basic Law.

The Movement for Quality Government (MQG), one of the petitioners challenging the legislation, rejected that position in a response filed on Sunday, arguing that the Knesset’s supplementary arguments added no new factual or legal basis and largely repeated claims already made during last month’s hearing.

MQG asked the court to make its conditional orders absolute, which would mean accepting the petitions and invalidating the challenged provisions.

The dispute concerns an amendment to Basic Law: The Judiciary and a complementary amendment to the Courts Law that would change the composition of the nine-member Judicial Selection Committee and how it appoints judges at every level.

The Basic Law amendment passed 67-1 in March 2025 and is scheduled to take effect when the next Knesset begins its term. Nine petitions are now being heard together.

The Knesset’s four-part response

The supplementary arguments were submitted on July 22 after an 11-justice panel questioned the Knesset and government one day earlier over whether the new system would make judges more dependent on political approval and weaken judicial independence.

The court issued conditional orders requiring explanations as to why the legislation should not be struck down, with the central question being whether the changes damage Israel’s democratic identity so seriously that the court may intervene despite their status as a Basic Law.

The Knesset divided its response into four parts: the composition of the committee, appointments to lower courts, appointments to the Supreme Court, and a mechanism intended to break prolonged deadlocks over Supreme Court vacancies.

Under the current system, the committee includes three Supreme Court justices, two ministers, two MKs, and two representatives of the Israel Bar Association.

The new system would remove the IBA representatives and replace them with two jurists qualified to serve on the Supreme Court, one selected by coalition MKs and the other by opposition MKs.

That would leave four members selected by the coalition, including one of the jurists; three Supreme Court justices; and two members selected by the opposition, also including one jurist.

The Knesset said lawmakers had given four main reasons for removing the IBA representatives: 1. concerns that lawyers who appear before judges have an inherent conflict of interest when deciding their promotion, 2. the IBA’s involvement in national politics, 3. a past case in which a bar representative was suspected of advancing appointments in exchange for a bribe, and 4. a desire to give elected representatives greater influence over judicial selection.

During the hearing, the justices questioned why replacing the IBA representatives with other lawyers would solve any conflict-of-interest problems. The IBA also argued that it holds nationwide information about judges’ professionalism and conduct that is important when candidates are considered for promotion.

Knesset: Basic Law should not be invalidated over system preference

The Knesset answered that IBA representatives were particularly vulnerable to professional conflicts because they were elected by lawyers with direct financial and professional interests in judicial decisions.

It acknowledged that the IBA possesses important information but said it could share that material with the committee without holding two seats and without votes on it.

More fundamentally, the Knesset argued that the court was asking the wrong question if it focused on whether the IBA’s participation was helpful or whether the new committee would be better than the old one.

The relevant question, it said, was whether removing the IBA and increasing the influence of elected representatives negated the core of Israel’s democratic identity.

A Basic Law should not be invalidated merely because the court considers the previous system preferable, the Knesset argued, since the authority to establish and change Israel’s constitutional arrangements belongs to the Knesset, acting as the constituent authority.

The legislation would also lower the threshold for selecting Supreme Court justices from seven of the committee’s nine members to five.

The five-member majority would have to include one coalition-side member and one opposition-side member, but would no longer require the support of any of the three Supreme Court justices.

The Knesset said the current seven-vote requirement effectively gives the justices acting together a veto over the selection of their future colleagues. The new system, it argued, would instead require agreement between representatives selected by both the coalition and opposition.

During a hearing last month, the justices expressed concern that the change could leave judicial candidates identified as coalition or opposition choices and influence the conduct of lower-court judges seeking promotion.

Justice Alex Stein asked whether an ambitious district court judge would feel a need to “find favor in the eyes of politicians,” while Supreme Court President Isaac Amit warned that future justices could carry a political “chip” identifying those responsible for their selection.

The Knesset said the possibility that an appointee would be publicly associated with those who supported them already existed under the current system and in other senior public appointments.

Judges, it argued, were required to detach themselves from those who helped appoint them – and decide cases independently, whether their supporters had been politicians, lawyers, or other judges.

It also rejected the petitioners’ argument that increased political involvement would necessarily reduce public confidence in the courts.

While the petitioners said the new system would damage trust by politicizing appointments, the Knesset said most lawmakers who supported the amendment believed public trust had already been harmed by the Supreme Court justices’ involvement in selecting their future colleagues.

The Knesset further argued that, even if the professional standard of future Supreme Court appointments were assumed to fall, lawmakers could decide that the risk was justified by greater public trust and a more socially and judicially diverse bench.

It stressed that this was a hypothetical argument rather than an admission that professional standards would decline.

Under the amendment, appointments to the magistrate’s and district courts would continue to require five votes, but the majority would have to include at least one judge, one coalition-side member, and one opposition-side member.

Petitioners warned that giving each bloc an effective veto could paralyze the committee and prevent vacancies from being filled.

The Knesset acknowledged the risk of deadlock, but said it was the unavoidable price of requiring broader consensus. It argued that predictions of future paralysis remained speculative and could not justify invalidating a Basic Law before the system had begun operating.

The legislation also includes a separate fallback procedure that could be activated once during a Knesset term if two Supreme Court vacancies remain unfilled for an extended period.

Coalition-side and opposition-side members would each submit a list of candidates from which the other committee members would initially choose. If no candidate were selected within the required period, the members who submitted the list could eventually make the choice themselves.

The Knesset acknowledged that the procedure had its disadvantages but argued that leaving Supreme Court positions vacant indefinitely was worse.

MQG said on Sunday that none of those arguments changed the factual or legal foundations of the case, and there was no need for a further substantive response.

The case will now return to the 11-justice panel for a ruling, unless the court requests further submissions or schedules another hearing.

This post was originally published on here. 

Shin Bet Chief David Zini officially visited Israel Police’s Counterterrorism Unit (YAMAM) for the first time on Sunday, according to a statement from the Shin Bet and Israel Police.

Zini met with YAMAM’s head, Deputy-Chief “A,” to discuss the partnership between the Shin Bet and YAMAM, including operational and technological responses to terrorism in Israel.

The two security leaders reviewed recent achievements by the collaboration between their organizations, notably the successful prevention of terror threats that could’ve jeopardized the country’s security.

At the end of the visit, Zini laid a wreath at a memorial at the unit’s base to recognize the YAMAM lives lost in action.

YAMAM was established in 1974 as one of four special units of the Border Police. It serves as a special force for counterterrorism, hostage rescue, and offensive raids.

YAMAM spearheaded Gaza hostage rescue missions 

After the October 7 Massacre, YAMAM helped execute two major hostage-rescue missions, including the June 8, 2024 Operation Arnon that brought Noa Argamani, Shlomi Ziv, Almog Meir Jan, and Andrey Kozlov home from Gaza.

Earlier that year, the counter-terrorism unit rescued Kibbutz Nir Yitzhak residents Fernando Marman and Luis Har from Rafah in a covert nighttime raid. The Shin Bet and the IDF aided in the hostage missions as well. 

YAMAM and the Shin Bet often collaborate on high-risk operations, with the Shin Bet providing internal intelligence for YAMAM to carry out boots-on-the-ground missions. 

Zini took office as head of the Shin Bet on October 5, 2025, as Ronen Bar’s replacement. 

This post was originally published on here. 

When Jimmy Carter occupied the White House, Menachem Begin was the prime minister of Israel. Carter viewed the world through a deeply religious and, at times, naïve lens. 

To him and many around him, Ruhollah Khomeini appeared to be a pious and even saintly religious figure. Even then-CIA director Adm. Stansfield Turner and perhaps those responsible for the Tehran desk lacked a real understanding of Khomeinism or of the ideological doctrines contained in the Shi’ite clerical canon.

However, Gen. Yitzhak Hofi, who was the head of the Mossad, understood that Israel’s true regional ally, SAVAK, was warning of the emergence of a poisonous mushroom, a cancerous growth, and an expanding infection inside Iran. 

The shah – America’s and Israel’s ally and trusted friend – was battling cancer, yet he understood better than anyone the danger posed by the rise of Islamist terrorism. Carter and the CIA failed to grasp the shah’s warnings, and their misjudgment burdened the world with a crisis that has endured for nearly half a century. The monstrous genie of Islamist terrorism and militant Shi’ite ideology escaped from the bottle.

Nearly 50 years later, neither the people of Iran nor the Middle East have experienced peace and normalcy, nor has the Middle East enjoyed stability and lasting security. 

The Arab states of the Persian Gulf, which once regarded the shah of Iran as their elder brother and the guarantor of regional peace and security, suddenly found their own existence, identity, and survival under threat.

A group seized power that had little understanding of humanity, law, order, or peace. An ideology was constructed upon the lies and deception of a Shi’ite clerical octopus, centered on the myth of “the twelfth imam” – a figure who, in reality, has no physical existence. 

Upon this belief, a state was established whose rulers, from Khomeini to Ali Khamenei and others, claimed to be his representatives until his eventual return. 

According to their doctrine, all humanity will supposedly be redeemed once the twelfth imam conquers the world with his sword and delivers humanity before God.

Western civilization fails to understand Iran’s ideology

Regrettably, this ideological language of Khomeini and Khamenei was never properly translated or explained to the intellectual world.
Beyond Israeli media, even many Arab, American, and European circles were reluctant to expose or confront it openly.

Those who wrote critically in Israeli publications often faced assassination threats.

Today, meanwhile, the Iranian regime’s mafia-like networks and its lobbying apparatus routinely wage character assassination campaigns against anyone perceived as sympathetic toward Israel or the Jewish people.

Yet the ideological framework of Khomeini and the Shi’ite Islamic revolution consists of several interconnected dimensions that together form the clerical doctrine. At its foundation lie deception, manipulation, fraud, malice, terrorism, expansionism, and ideological domination.

What Adolf Hitler or Iraq’s Saddam Hussein only dreamed of accomplishing against Israel, Khomeini and Khamenei sought to implement. 

They established an extensive network of Islamist terrorist organizations, including the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, Hashd al-Shaabi, the Zainabiyoun Brigade, the Fatemiyoun Brigade, and the Houthis. 

They pursued nuclear and chemical weapons programs. They built a 24-hour propaganda and media machine over nearly five decades. They developed terrorist sleeper cells inside Israel, Europe, and the United States. They manufactured missiles, drones, and bombs, transforming Iran into a vast military garrison and weapons depot.

This regime began its rule through executions, mass killings, torture, and repression against the Iranian people, turning cemeteries into monuments of its governance.

Even today, much of the Western world remains unfamiliar with the ideological foundations of the Shi’ite clerical doctrine. More fundamentally, the European and American political imagination often lacks the capacity to comprehend the scale of brutality, malice, and ideological fanaticism embodied by the rulers of Iran and their worldview. 

Otherwise, by the most basic standards of morality and humanity, they would never willingly share a platform or a photograph with them, negotiate with them, or expect rational diplomacy and good faith from such a regime.
As the world celebrated the collapse of apartheid, communism, and Nazism, so too the day will eventually come when Islamist terrorism will meet the same fate. 

Meanwhile, history may ultimately record that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu left his fingerprints on that struggle – and so too US President Donald Trump.

Perhaps the current strategic convergence between the Mossad and the CIA will encourage Trump to act with greater resolve. Yet, regrettably, the influence of lobbying networks affiliated with the Islamic Republic in Washington and across Europe continues to muffle the genuine call for regime change in Tehran.

Still, for the historical record, one may write this: From Tehran comes the sound of savagery. The remnants of the Islamic Republic continue to sell deception as diplomacy. 

Even the so-called mediators are manipulated and orchestrated by the regime itself. From Pakistan, which became a significant trap for Trump, to Turkey, Qatar, and Iraq, Tehran has repeatedly sought to manipulate and mislead Washington through intermediaries.

Tehran seeks war, not peace

There is reason for cautious optimism that Trump understands that the voice emanating from Tehran is not one of peace but of violence. The CIA likewise understands that this regime has little genuine interest in negotiations or a lasting agreement. 

Perhaps during an upcoming meeting between Trump and Netanyahu, one central truth will once again be voiced: that the collapse of the nearly 50-year-old regime of Islamist terrorism and the Shi’ite Islamist state in Tehran would mark the birth of a new Middle East.

This would liberate 90 million Iranians while freeing the broader Middle East, and indeed humanity, in the 21st century from a regime built upon destructive and extremist ideas.

Undoubtedly, even after such a collapse, the period before genuinely democratic elections would be turbulent. 
Society would witness the eruption of long-suppressed grievances, personal reckonings, and the exposure of underground Islamist terrorist networks embedded in mosques and clandestine organizations. 

Yet even the most imperfect democracy is preferable to tyranny. Religious despotism and the reign of death and barbarism would finally depart from Iran.

If Trump comes to understand this historical reality, history may remember him as one of the leaders who helped transform the Middle East. If, however, he yields to illusions or to the deceptive narratives promoted by some within his own circle, history may judge him far less kindly.

The deceptive marketplace created by Tehran’s rulers may ultimately descend into internal rivalries and struggles for power, but that is of secondary importance. Such turmoil would simply be the painful labor through which a nation is reborn.

Today, figures such as CIA Director John Radcliffe and Trump on one side, and Netanyahu and Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) chief Maj.-Gen. David Zini on the other, understand the nature of the regime they confront. 

A government willing to slaughter and massacre more than 50,000 of its own citizens merely to preserve its grip on power has every intention of leaving behind a scorched-earth Iran if it cannot survive. 

To suggest that this regime has fundamentally changed is not only an unconvincing argument but one that defies reason. The structure and core of the Islamic Republic remain rooted in a destructive and pathological ideology. Nothing short of its complete dismantlement and a change of regime can resolve the crisis.

After nearly half a century, one of the most reviled, brutal, and inhumane regimes of the modern era can finally come to an end. 

If that day arrives, the free world will celebrate the defeat of a system that has exported terror, repression, and instability for decades.

Fortunately, the Iranian people are not without a credible and widely recognized alternative. They have exiled Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi – a national figure capable of guiding Iran through a peaceful democratic transition, preventing the country from descending into a bloodbath, and helping safeguard a nation whose civilization stretches back more than 7,000 years.

The writer is a Middle East political analyst. His book, Tehran’s Dictator, examines the theocratic era of Ali Khamenei (1989-2026). Follow him on X: @EQFard

This post was originally published on here. 

Bahrain cannot claim state immunity to block a lawsuit brought in Britain by two dissidents who say its government hacked their laptops with spyware, the United Kingdom’s Supreme Court ruled by a majority on Monday.

Saeed Shehabi and Moosa Mohammed allege Bahrain infected their computers with surveillance software called FinSpy around 2011, which allowed agents to monitor their work with political prisoners in the Gulf kingdom.

The men, who both live in Britain, sued Bahrain at London’s High Court in 2020, seeking damages for “psychiatric harm”.

Bahrain denies hacking Shehabi and Mohammed’s laptops and has for several years sought to claim state immunity to defeat the lawsuit.

Bahrain’s assertion of state immunity was refused by London’s High Court in 2023 and then the Court of Appeal the following year, prompting an appeal to the UK’s highest court.

Bahrain cannot block spyware lawsuit

The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed Bahrain’s appeal by a 3-to-2 majority, ruling that the alleged surveillance took place in Britain even if it was initiated from abroad.

This meant the alleged hacking came within the personal injury exception to state immunity under UK law and that Shehabi and Mohammed’s case could proceed.

This post was originally published on here. 

The International Criminal Court (ICC) faces a challenging search for a new prosecutor after Karim Khan was dismissed, against the backdrop of a US diplomatic campaign to undermine the court and a rise in states withdrawing from the institution.

On Monday, Chad became the fifth country to start the formal withdrawal process in recent months, following Venezuela, Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger.

The African state’s announcement came just days after 82 of the court’s 125 member states voted to dismiss Khan for serious misconduct. That triggered an election process for a new prosecutor, but details still have to be hammered out, and a vote is not expected before the new year.

After Khan’s removal from office, the court said it will continue to carry out its mandate.

“The ICC remains firmly committed to advancing accountability and delivering justice for victims of crimes that deeply shock the conscience of humanity,” it said.

While the ICC member states consider the procedure to find Khan’s replacement, the office of the prosecutor will be run by the current deputy prosecutors, Nazhat Shameen Khan from Fiji and Senegal’s Mame Mandiaye Niang.

Court watchers say it may be hard to find a good replacement for Khan amid the US’s ramped-up diplomatic campaign.

“Who is now going to want to nominate for a position that has such challenges, because they know they will automatically be sanctioned by the US,” Melanie O’Brien, professor of international law at the University of Western Australia, told Reuters.

US sanctions loom over search for new prosecutor

Washington wants the ICC to drop its arrest warrants against Israeli leaders over Gaza and to stop investigating alleged crimes involving US troops. Officials told Reuters they were considering pressuring countries to withdraw from the court.

Chad announced its withdrawal on Monday, and late Friday Venezuela, where the ICC had been conducting investigations into allegations of crimes against humanity by the previous government, said it had started the formal procedure to withdraw. Both states accused the court of disproportionately focusing on non-Western states.

In early July, the court said three military-led African countries – Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger – formally started their withdrawal, which takes a year to go into effect.

The European Union and several of the court’s big backers, including the Netherlands and Japan, one of the court’s biggest financial contributors, have voiced support for the court and concern over the US position but have not announced any practical steps to shore up the institution.

In the coming months, the court’s governing body, the Assembly of States Parties (ASP), is expected to set out the specific procedure for the election of a new prosecutor. Many legal commentators have criticized the process around Khan’s removal for its lack of transparency.

The next election will be a litmus test, especially since earlier votes were criticized for facing a lot of political influence and last-minute changes of procedure, according to Ezequiel Jimenez Martinez, who wrote a book on governing the ICC.

“The ASP now needs to reassure stakeholders it has the stamina to support the court in its darkest hour and elect a prosecutor worth the office and role,” he told Reuters.

This post was originally published on here. 

The IDF said Monday that troops operating in southern Lebanon found two drawings of Adolf Hitler inside a private home in the village of Taybeh.

According to Arabic-language IDF spokesperson Ella Waweya, known as “Captain Ella,” the drawings were signed with the name Hassan Haidar and were believed to belong to a larger portfolio of artwork.

The military said it suspected the portfolio had been prepared for a school operating under Hezbollah’s auspices, describing the drawings as evidence of Nazi ideology being promoted in Shi’ite schools in southern Lebanon.

#عاجل وخطير 🔸| جيش الدفاع يكشف: العثور على رسمين لأدولف هتلر خلال نشاط عملياتي في جنوب لبنان

🔸خلال نشاط عملياتي نفذتها قوات اللواء القتالي 7 في قرية الطيبة بجنوب لبنان، عُثر على رسمين لأدولف هتلر، ويُرجَّح أنهما كانا جزءًا من ملف أعمال مخصص للمدعو حسن حيدر (حسب التوقيع).… pic.twitter.com/KMFVslecqF

— Lieutenant Colonel Ella Waweya | إيلا واوية (@CaptainElla1) July 27, 2026

The IDF did not provide further evidence in the post to identify the artist or to establish the portfolio’s connection to Hezbollah.

Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire holding as Israel begins withdrawal from Lebanon

The discovery comes as a US-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah broadly holds and Israel begins testing a phased withdrawal from parts of southern Lebanon. Under a US-backed pilot program, the Lebanese Army has begun entering Froun, Srifa and Zawtar al-Gharbiya, with Israel so far withdrawing from Zawtar.

It remains unclear whether the process will lead to wider withdrawals, while Israeli forces continue to hold a security zone several kilometers inside Lebanon.

Yonah Jeremy Bob contributed to this report.

This post was originally published on here. 

The Iranian-backed Houthis have been escalating attacks and rhetoric against Saudi Arabia throughout July. This led to concerns that international shipping via the Red Sea could be disrupted.

Reports in Yemen suggest that the Houthis downed a Turkish-made Saudi Arabian drone over the country. The Houthis have downed drones in the past, especially American Reapers. As such, the Houthis are showing that they won’t back down. However, a reduction in US-Iran tensions could lead to a reduction in Yemen tensions.

The conflict in Yemen is complex. It recently increased when Saudi Arabia and the government in Yemen opposed Iran flying to Sana’a, the Houthi capital. The Houthis accused Saudi Arabia of bombing the airport. The Houthis then said that if the Saudis continued their blockade on the Houthis, then the Houthis would enact a blockade on the Saudi shipping in the Red Sea.

Meanwhile, the Financial Times reported that “top shipping insurers have told brokers that they will not sell war cargo insurance to Saudi Arabia-linked ships in the Red Sea, following attacks by Yemen’s Houthi rebels, in a further risk to oil exports from the region.”

This report added that “several of the leading marine war insurers at Lloyd’s of London market said on Friday that they would exclude vessels with any “Saudi touchpoints” from coverage, two brokers said, including ships traveling under other flags that have made past calls at Saudi ports.”

Houthis claim attacks on Saudi Arabia

The Houthis have claimed attacks in the last few days on Yanbu and Jizan areas in Saudi Arabia. These are key port facilities for Riyadh.

How did we get here? The Iranian-backed Houthis have transformed themselves over the last two decades from a relatively isolated movement in northern Yemen into one of the most powerful armed groups in the Middle East. Emerging from Yemen’s Zaidi Shi’ite community, the Houthis fought the Yemeni government during the 2000s before seizing Sana’a in 2014. Their advance eventually forced the internationally recognized government from the capital.

Saudi Arabia intervened in Yemen in 2015 at the head of an Arab coalition seeking to prevent a complete Houthi takeover.

What followed was years of grinding conflict. During this period, Iran increased its support for the Houthis, providing technology and expertise that helped the group develop an increasingly sophisticated arsenal of ballistic missiles and drones. These weapons enabled the Houthis to threaten Saudi cities, energy infrastructure and shipping far beyond Yemen.

UN-brokered 2022 truce reduces fighting between Houthis, Saudi Arabia

 A UN-brokered truce in 2022 significantly reduced fighting between the Houthis and the Saudi-backed government. Although the formal truce expired, a de facto ceasefire largely held, and Riyadh pursued negotiations aimed at extricating itself from the conflict.

Then came October 7, 2023, and the Hamas attack on Israel. The Houthis then claimed that this had changed the equation and they would support Hamas and Gaza in the war.

The Houthis sought to increasingly position themselves as a key member of Iran’s regional axis and began launching missiles and drones toward Israel. They also targeted commercial vessels in the Red Sea, claiming the attacks were linked to Israel or were carried out in support of Gaza. These attacks ended with the US-backed ceasefire in October 2025.

It remains to be seen if the Saudi-Houthi conflict will now grow or if it may be reduced in the coming weeks. 

This post was originally published on here. 

Two Israeli civilians were detained Monday after crossing the border into Syrian territory near Mount Hermon, the IDF said, as Syrian media separately reported that troops had arrested a Syrian citizen during an overnight raid in the Quneitra area.

According to the military, troops dispatched to the Hermon located the two, returned them to Israeli territory and transferred them to police.

The IDF condemned the crossing as a criminal offense that disrupted military operations and endangered troops, calling on law enforcement authorities to prevent those involved from repeatedly entering the area.

Israeli civilians attempting to establish settlements in Syria

The incident follows several attempts in recent weeks by Israeli activists seeking to establish civilian settlements in territory inside Syria. Around 100 activists were detained after crossing into the Syrian side of Mount Hermon earlier this month, with smaller groups making further attempts since then.

Separately, Syrian media reported Monday morning that IDF troops entered the village of Taranja in northern Quneitra and detained a Syrian resident after searching homes. 

The developments come as Damascus says it is seeking a security agreement with Israel and as the Trump administration pressures Israel to redeploy from areas of southern Syria held since the fall of Bashar Assad’s government in December 2024.

This post was originally published on here. 

The remains of Shimon and Rivka Herzl, the grandparents of modern political Zionism’s founder, Theodor Herzl, are being brought from Belgrade, Serbia, to be reinterred beside his grave on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem in the coming days. 

A high-level state funeral and burial ceremony is scheduled to take place on August 5, coinciding with the 77th anniversary of Theodor Herzl’s own reburial in 1949, when his remains were exhumed and brought to Jerusalem from Vienna.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Isaac Herzog have both confirmed that they will attend the ceremony.

The initiative is being led by World Zionist Organization (WZO) Chairman Yaakov Hagoel in coordination with the Serbian authorities and the local Jewish community.

Hagoel secured the repatriation with the aid of an agreement for the exhumation from Željka Cvijanović, president of Republika Srpska, during her visit to Mount Herzl on a WZO-organized trip to Israel in 2021. Although the diplomatic arrangement was established years ago, the transfer faced multiple delays over the subsequent four years due to regional security challenges and logistical hurdles before finally moving forward.

Herzl’s grandparents inspired his Zionist thinking

Shimon Loeb Herzl was an Orthodox Jew who served in honorary leadership roles in the Zemun community in Serbia.

Influenced by his close ties to the town’s spiritual leader and early Zionist forerunner Rabbi Yehuda Alkalai, Shimon became an enthusiastic advocate for establishing a Jewish state in the Land of Israel. Shimon and Rivka helped inspire, guide, and influence Theodor’s Zionist thinking that would create the movement that he later founded. 

With the exception of Herzl’s third daughter, Trude Herzl, who perished in the Holocaust (at the Theresienstadt ghetto), and whose exact final resting place remains unknown, the arrival and reburial of his grandparents will reunite the founder of Zionism with all his immediate family members, joining his parents, his sister Pauline, two of his children (Pauline and Hans), and his only grandson, Stephen Theodor Norman, who rest together on the mount. 

This post was originally published on here. 

New episodes every Sunday-Thursday. 

Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

For more news, analysis, and the latest updates, head to jpost.com.

Headlines edited by Shir Perets. 

Hosted and produced by Shifra Jacobs.

This post was originally published on here. 

The vast majority of religious Zionists favor dialogue leading to social consensus over parliamentary or legal processes to solve Israel’s social issues, a Tzohar poll held during Tuesday’s annual conference revealed.

According to the poll, 79% of religious Zionist attendees prefer to solve these issues with grassroots dialogue, whereas only 15% believe these problems can be resolved through new legislation.

The conference, which has become an increasingly popular event on the community calendar, follows several significant changes regarding the religion-state dynamic in Israel.

On July 14, the Bnei Brak became the first Israeli city to legislate gender-segregated streets, after the municipality decided to turn sections of Shlomo Hamelech and Ezra streets into segregated streets.

Earlier that day, the Knesset passed a heavily criticized bill to freeze the arrest of haredi draft dodgers.

‘There is a huge thirst today for spirituality in Israel’: Tzohar founder says

Rabbi David Stav, founder and chair of Tzohar, also addressed the issue of distorted religion perceived by secular Israelis on The Orthodox Conundrum podcast last week.

Rabbi Stav explained that there exists a “huge thirst today for spirituality, to understand our story–What is the Jewish story? What are our values?” 

“And instead of making this window of opportunity a source of inspiration…we take Torah and put it in a place where people feel that Torah is against all human fundamental beliefs,” he added.

“The way that Torah is perceived today [by secular Israelis] is that it is not moral, haredi, not realistic, relying on others…something [to which] they don’t want to relate.”

“The attendance of thousands of people here today reflects a broad desire of our community to have a voice on key issues of the day,” Rabbi Stav pointed out at the conference. 

“Our goal with this annual event is to present a chance to discuss topics ranging from personal challenges such as raising children in the modern world, to broader social issues about how we can create a more united Jewish society amidst the many ongoing changes Israel and the Jewish world are experiencing.”

The survey was conducted among nearly 3,000 participants at the annual summer conference of the Tzohar Rabbinical Organization, held at the Tel Aviv Expo. It focused on the theme of “For the Sake of Heaven and Earth,” bringing together leading rabbinical, educational and social thinkers to address many of the key issues confronting the religious Zionist community post Oct. 7. 

This post was originally published on here. 

The UK’s new Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, came under fire recently from the Shadow Justice Secretary, Nick Timothy, in response to the appointment of Andy Slaughter, an MP fiercely critical of Israel with a long record of pro-Palestine activism, as the new Solicitor General. Timothy described it as an “absolute disgrace” and said it “beggars belief” that Labour would give control of the government’s legal department to someone who had “sympathy for Hamas.”

Timothy’s remarks were referring to the recent resurfacing of photos following the appointment showing Slaughter with Hamas associates.

The Solicitor General serves as a core legal adviser to the government and helps oversee public-interest functions, including granting specific legal consents for certain terrorism-related prosecutions. 

So, who is Andy Slaughter and what does his past record tell us about his positions on Israel and the Middle East conflict and related topics?

Slaughter and former Labor Party leader Jeremy Corbyn posed alongside Hamas associates Mohammed Totah, Ahmed Attoun, and Khaled Abu-Arafehat at a meeting in Jerusalem during a fact-finding trip to the region in November 2010 sponsored by Friends of Al-Aqsa and Middle East Monitor (Memo). 

Slaughter reportedly claimed to have met with Faraj al-Ghoul, Hamas’s Justice Minister, and Dr Ahmed Yousef, Hamas’s Deputy Foreign Minister, during another undeclared visit to Gaza with the Britain-Palestine All Party Group. 

Both Yousef and al-Ghoul were later assassinated by Israel during the war that followed the October 7 massacre. 

Slaughter wrote in a 2010 article shortly after meeting with Hamas associates that Israel should negotiate with Hamas “without preconditions.”

“A whole generation is growing up in conditions that are a breeding ground for intolerance and aggression, as we saw last week,” Slaughter wrote. “One way to break the deadlock is to negotiate without preconditions with those who have a mandate and a willingness to achieve progress. From my experience now on several visits to the region in the past three years, this includes Hamas.”

Slaughter accuses Israel of killing civilians 

On numerous occasions, Slaughter has said on his X/Twitter account that the Israeli military indiscriminately kills civilians.

The UK’s Jewish News website reported in November 2015 that Slaughter was alleged to have made remarks implying that Israel “fabricates and invents” reasons to kill Palestinians during a meeting of the Palestinian Return Center in October.  

In January 2024, a few months into Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, Slaughter told the UK parliament, “The Minister says Israeli military action should be targeted on Hamas leaders and operatives. He knows better than anyone it is not.”

Slaughter added that “ending trade with illegal settlements is, as a matter of fact and law, unrelated to boycott, divestment, and sanctions.”

In February 2025, Slaughter urged the UK government several times to respond to the International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) advisory opinion.

The ICJ advisory opinion refers to the case brought forward by South Africa to the ICJ against Israel during its war against Hamas, accusing Israel of committing genocide. In July 2024, the court delivered an advisory opinion declaring that Israel’s presence in the Palestinian territories was unlawful and must be brought to an end. 

Israel to blame for PA textbook antisemitism, Slaughter claims

The Campaign Against Antisemitism reported in June 2021 that Slaughter was among numerous MPs who “appeared to excuse antisemitism in Palestinian Authority textbooks” during a Parliamentary debate following the publication of an EU Review into Palestinian school textbooks which revealed anti-Jewish racism within the curriculum.

Slaughter reportedly blamed Israel for the textbooks’ antisemitism. Slaughter conceded that there were “regrettable passages” in the textbooks but went on to say: “Above all, there is an inequality of arms. What the Israelis have been able to do to the Palestinians over 53 years of military occupation, with 650,000 Israelis in illegal settlements, and many other things during this crisis, needs to be addressed. That is the real root of the problem that has to be dealt with.”

Slaughter has long advocated in parliament for the UK to suspend arms supplies to Israel, including throughout 2025 during its ongoing war in Gaza, Lebanon, and Iran.

Slaughter addressed parliament on May 15, 2018, by acknowledging that it was Nakba Day and “the seventieth anniversary of the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.” 

In the same speech to parliament, Slaughter proceeded to tell the chamber that “Israel chooses to mark it by escalating the murder and maiming of civilians in Gaza” and called for the suspension of arms sales to Israel.

Slaughter’s comments referred to Palestinians who had been protesting and rioting at the Israel-Gaza border as part of the March of Return protests, which began in March 2018, attempting to breach Israel’s border fence.

New Solicitor General promotes boycott goods from settlements

While Slaughter campaigns for an arms embargo against Israel, he has also claimed while speaking to parliament, “I have never been a particular supporter of BDS because it is a blunt weapon.”  

For many years, Slaughter has promoted the boycotting of goods from Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

Slaughter said during a speech to parliament in May 2018, “We should address the specific issues where Israel has got it wrong, and where we have got it wrong. One is on recognition; another is on trading with settlements.”

Jewish communities have campaigned globally for governments and institutions to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism in order to combat growing anti-Semitic incidents. In 2018 Slaughter voted against the Labour party’s adoption of the IHRA definition.

Slaughter celebrated in September 2025 the UK’s recognition of the state of Palestine. Slaughter participated in the opening of the embassy, located in his London constituency in Hammersmith, where he serves as the Labour MP for Hammersmith & Chiswick.  

Slaughter has long engaged in pro-Palestinian activism with various local activist groups, including the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC), where he has led up front at marches and spoken to crowds.

Slaughter voted in favor of proscribing Palestine Action as a terrorist group. The group was banned under the Terrorism Act 2000 following a government assessment that its sustained campaign of direct action, property damage, and attacks against defense firms and national infrastructure crossed the legal threshold for domestic extremism and terrorism. 

Slaughter says he believes that lasting peace is to be achieved through “recognition of both states, adherence to international law, and an end to occupation.” 

Ultimately, Slaughter’s elevation to the role of Solicitor General places an official with a long-standing record of critical positions on Israel into a key governmental advisory post. Given his historical advocacy for arms embargoes, settlement goods boycotts, and unilateral Palestinian state recognition, his tenure introduces a prominent critic of Israeli policy into the heart of Britain’s legal establishment.

This post was originally published on here. 

A man was arrested in Paris, France, after wounding three people with two kitchen knives, police stated on Monday.

The incident took place near Place de Clichy, police stated, adding that the three victims were taken to the hospital.

French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez told reporters that all three victims were women.

🔴🇫🇷BREAKING NEWS – Possible video of the perpetrator of the knife attack in Paris near Porte de Clichy. pic.twitter.com/Le2XEwaVtl

— Media Express (@media_express_) July 27, 2026

The man attacked the three women, who were aged 19, 24 and 36, with two kitchen knives, severely wounding two of them, Nunez said.

Attacker detained by off-duty police officer

The minister said the man had been detained by an off-duty police officer. “I pay tribute to him, it was a courageous act,” Nunez added.

The motive of the attack remains unknown, Nunez said, adding police could not verify the identity of the attacker, whose declarations were “incoherent” when he was being arrested.

This post was originally published on here. 

The US Senate is due to begin voting as early as Monday on the nomination of Manhattan US Attorney Jay Clayton, US President Donald Trump‘s pick to be the top US spy, and he is expected to be approved within days despite a tense confirmation hearing.

If approved to be the director of national intelligence, Clayton would fill a role vacated in June when Tulsi Gabbard stepped down after a tenure marked by clashes with congressional Democrats, who accused her of advancing Trump’s political agenda and promoting debunked election claims.

The Senate is due to hold a procedural vote Monday evening on whether to advance Clayton’s nomination for the job overseeing the nation’s 18 intelligence agencies.

The position of DNI was created after the September 11, 2001, attacks to coordinate the country’s sprawling intelligence apparatus. Many senators are eager for Clayton to take up the post because they are unhappy with the interim director of national intelligence, Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte, a Trump loyalist without national security experience who has been cutting staff at the agency.

If Clayton wins a majority in the 100-member Senate on the procedural vote, a final confirmation vote is expected later in the week. Trump’s Republicans, who have a 53-47 majority in the chamber and rarely break from the White House, are expected to provide Clayton with enough votes for confirmation even if Democrats balk.

Intelligence Committee recommends Clayton to Senate by narrow vote

The Senate Intelligence Committee recommended Clayton to the full Senate in a narrow 9-8 vote on Tuesday.

He received yes votes only from the panel’s Republicans after repeatedly refusing to directly acknowledge that Trump lost the 2020 presidential election despite repeated questioning during his confirmation hearing.

Clayton also faced questioning from Democrats about his decision to issue subpoenas ordering New York Times journalists to testify before a federal grand jury after reporting on security concerns involving Trump’s new Qatari-donated Air Force One plane.

A prosecutor said at a court hearing on Tuesday that the Trump administration would withdraw the subpoenas after a judge’s close questioning about the investigation.

“From start to finish, Mr. Clayton has proven himself incapable of telling the truth or demonstrating an iota of independence from Donald Trump. For those reasons, I voted ‘no’ on his nomination,” Oregon Senator Ron Wyden, a senior Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, said in a statement.

Republican committee chair calls nominee ‘highly qualified’

Republican Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton, who chairs the committee, called Clayton a “highly qualified nominee with a deep experience combating a wide range of national security threats.”

Clayton’s confirmation process was dogged by controversy even before his July 15 hearing. In mid-June, Trump abruptly threw doubt on his nomination by ordering the abrupt postponement of the hearing in an effort to force Congress to pass an overhaul of US voting rules.

Senators, including Cotton, said at the time they expected the hearing to go ahead as scheduled, but then said Clayton would not appear after Trump ordered him to stay away.

This post was originally published on here. 

Turkey is attempting to interfere in Israel’s upcoming election through activity on social media, senior Israeli security officials told The Jerusalem Post on Monday.

According to the officials, the activity is intended to influence Israeli public opinion, disrupt the election campaign and deepen divisions between different groups within Israeli society.

The officials did not provide details about the social media accounts, platforms or organizations involved. They also did not say whether the operation was being directed by the Turkish government.

The assessment places Turkey alongside Iran among the foreign actors Israeli security authorities suspect of attempting to influence the election and exploit divisions within Israeli society.

Further, the disclosure comes as Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) chief David Zini prepares to present information about indications of foreign election interference to a classified Knesset subcommittee on Monday, Israeli public broadcaster KAN News reported earlier on Monday.

Zini is also expected to brief lawmakers on Israel’s ability to track covert flows of money intended to finance political activity inside the country, according to the report. Central Elections Committee chairman and Supreme Court Deputy President Noam Sohlberg is also expected to attend the hearing.

The National Cyber Directorate told previous Knesset hearings that indications of attempted election interference had already been detected, KAN reported.

Foreign attempts to influence the vote have become a growing concern ahead of Israel’s October 27 election, the country’s first national election since the October 7 massacre and the war that followed.

Herzog warns of threats to election’s integrity

President Isaac Herzog warned last week about threats to the integrity of the election after meeting with Zini and Sohlberg.

Herzog urged law-enforcement authorities to act firmly against the threats and called on Israelis to exercise caution when consuming and sharing material on social media.

“Elections are a test for Israeli democracy, and they are also a test for the unity and cohesion of Israeli society,” Herzog said.

A State Comptroller’s Office report published earlier in July found that Israel had no national policy or designated government body responsible for coordinating the response to foreign online influence campaigns, despite authorities having identified the threat years ago.

State Comptroller Matanyahu Englman warned that hostile actors, including Iran, were using social media to deepen divisions, spread panic and manipulate Israelis’ understanding of events.

Former Central Elections Committee chairman Hanan Melcer also warned this month that Israel must prepare for attempts by foreign and domestic actors to interfere in the election, including through artificial intelligence and anonymous social media activity.

Sarah Ben-Nun contributed to this report.

This post was originally published on here. 

Israel’s next government will declare Qatar an “enemy state,” former prime minister and head of Together Naftali Bennett said at Israel’s National Security Conference (INSS) on Monday. 

“Qatar is a violent antisemitic cancer that sends metastases to the West and even to the office of the prime minister of Israel, with the aim of destroying the State of Israel,” Bennett accused at the conference.

According to Bennett, Qatar is a leading financier of Islamist terrorism, particularly of Hamas, whose hands are stained with the “blood of many Israelis who were murdered, raped, burned, and abducted” during the October 7 massacre.

Bennett: Qatar’s leaders want to eliminate Israel

Bennett also said Qatar had established “a global influence machine aimed at eliminating Israel,” adding that it operates and funds Al Jazeera, which has been banned in Israel over inciting hatred against the state.

“Had even the most basic commission of inquiry into October 7 been established, this would have been one of its first conclusions,” Bennett affirmed. “Qatar is an enemy state, and its leaders want to eliminate Israel.”

This post was originally published on here. 

This post was originally published on here. 

Israel would be blamed for the failure of another large-scale attack against Iran if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tries to persuade US President Donald Trump to renew the strikes during his upcoming visit, former senior defense official and Iranian nuclear expert Avner Vilan told 103FM on Monday.

“If he succeeds in persuading Trump to attack again, and the attack succeeds, I take my hat off to him,” Vilan said. “But if it does not succeed, the US will blame us even more for dragging it into a war that damaged its international standing and drove up fuel prices.”

Speaking with Ilil Shahar and Amichai Attali, Vilan explained that the US and Iran are locked in a fragile status quo between a new agreement and a return to full-scale war, ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s expected meeting with US President Donald Trump in Washington.

He added that neither side was satisfied with the current situation, but neither was in a hurry to change it.

“Since the end of Operation Roaring Lion, the situation has been neither here nor there, a kind of status quo involving a new balance of neither peace nor war. It may be a better situation for all the players than the alternatives. We have essentially been in the same situation since the end of March,” Vilan said.

The other options on the table, he said, were considerably more complex and dangerous. “The alternatives are an agreement or high-intensity war,” the former senior official pointed out.

Iranian concessions and the risks of renewed fighting

At this stage, however, Vilan assessed that Iran was not prepared to pay the price required under an agreement.

“Iran does not want to reach an agreement. It is not prepared to relinquish what it achieved in Hormuz, and therefore it would prefer war to going backward,” he said. “Of course, it does not want to initiate a high-intensity war, and it would prefer to buy time until the midterm elections or until there is a new president in the United States.”

The US administration’s room to maneuver has also narrowed. Vilan argued that Washington had already gone a significant distance in its efforts to reach an understanding and now expected concessions from Tehran.

“The US is currently in a difficult position,” Vilan said. “The US has reached the limit of the concessions it can make in an initial agreement. At this point, an agreement would have to include significant Iranian concessions, and that will not happen.”

At the same time, he did not view renewed strikes as a simple solution.

“A return to fighting would send oil prices soaring, and there is a larger question here: What would they gain from fighting? Can they change the Iranian position?”

Shortage of interceptor missiles playing a role in US’ strategy

The New York Times reported over the weekend that one of the considerations that prevented the US from launching a major attack on Iran was a shortage of interceptor missiles.

Vilan assessed that the report likely had some basis, but said the central question was not only military capability, but also the possible strategic outcome.

“I assume there is some truth to the report, and a shortage of interceptors is another consideration,” he said.

However, he stressed: “If we knew there was a plan that would bring about regime change in Iran and that afterward we would be friends forever and ever, perhaps I would support such a move even without interceptors.”

This post was originally published on here. 

The father of Fatemeh Soltani, who murdered the 18-year-old nail artist in April last year outside a salon, was sentenced to eight years in prison and ordered to pay diyah (blood money) by the the Tehran Criminal Court, according to a social media account taken over by the victim’s family, Iranian media reports, and human rights organizations.

Soltani was stabbed by her father in a violent attack on the street, witnessed by multiple passersby, and died on her way to the hospital. Video of the attack quickly spread online, with rumors that the young woman had been beheaded by her father for seeking economic independence.

Her father, according to the conservative Iranian media site Tabnak, went to the police after the killing to claim he had murdered his daughter over “moral issues.”  However, the victim’s brother told Khabar Online last year that his sister was killed because she had uncovered her father’s affair.

In court, Soltani’s mother testified that her husband had been a violent man and that her daughter had feared that he would use honor as a way to avoid qisa (a retributive punishment that allows the family of murder victims to demand the death penalty).

“I lived under the same roof as Fatemeh’s father for 27 years. I endured every hardship to build a good life and raise two well-mannered children. But from the very beginning, my husband was an angry man,” she testified, according to Tabnak. “He beat me many times, once breaking my nose and another time my teeth. He repeatedly held a knife to my throat and once stabbed my hand several times. I filed numerous complaints against him in different courts for verbal abuse and assault. He even once smashed the windows of my brother’s shop.

Soltani’s father defended his actions in court

“Then, in 2023, my husband cheated on me. My daughter found out and showed me his chats with another woman. From that point on, my husband threatened Fatemeh so severely that, in a voice message she sent me, she wished for death. He knew that in his village someone had killed their own child and that parents cannot be sentenced to qisas for killing their children. He would say that whenever he wanted, he could run over his children with his car.”

In court, Soltani’s father defended himself, claiming that he only beat his wife when she provoked him by dressing in a way inconsistent with the teachings of Islam, claiming she “practiced spirit summoning” and created financial stress for him.

He claimed he only began stabbing his daughter when she started insulting him for disgracing the family.

“She kept insulting me. I became enraged by what she was saying. I picked up a knife that had been under the seat since Sizdah Bedar and stabbed her once. Then, after she got out of the car, I stabbed her several more times,” he told the courts. “Suddenly I came to my senses and heard a woman screaming that I had killed my daughter. Only then did I realize what I had done to Fatemeh.”

This post was originally published on here. 

On Wednesday, July 27, 1955, El Al Flight 402 was cruising at around 18,000 feet over the Balkans when two Bulgarian MiG-15 fighter jets rose to intercept it.

The Lockheed Constellation, carrying 51 passengers and seven crew from London to Tel Aviv, had strayed from its assigned airway and crossed into communist Bulgaria. The Bulgarian fighter jets opened fire, and the airliner began to descend, burning, as the crew apparently tried to reach safety near the Greek border.

The plane never reached the ground intact.

Struck a second time as it descended through 8,000 feet, the Constellation was attacked again near 2,000 feet. It broke apart in midair and fell in flames near the town of Petrich. There were no survivors.

For several hours, however, the full horror remained unknown. El Al’s first statement spoke of an SOS message, gunfire and a “forced landing” inside Bulgaria.

By the following morning, July 28, the truth had reached Israel. All 58 passengers and crew were dead.

That day, The Jerusalem Post carried the news across its front page beneath the headline: “Israel Lodges ‘Vehement Protest’ At Shooting Down of El Al Airliner.” Underneath, in still larger human terms, were the words: “All 58 Passengers, Crew Dead.”

Flight 402 had begun its scheduled journey in London the previous evening, stopping in Paris and Vienna. At 2:53 a.m., it departed Vienna for Lod Airport on the final leg of the journey. Its course was supposed to follow the Amber 10 airway over Yugoslavia and Greece, avoiding the tightly guarded territory of the Soviet-aligned People’s Republic of Bulgaria.

Somewhere over Yugoslavia, something went wrong. The aircraft left the airway and turned toward the Bulgarian frontier. An accident account later suggested that the crew may have misidentified the Skopje radio beacon after an incorrect radio-compass indication, possibly affected by storm activity. The reason for the deviation was never established beyond dispute.

What followed was less ambiguous. Bulgarian air defenses detected the airliner and sent two MiG-15s to meet it. Bulgaria later claimed that its pilots had fired warning shots and instructed the aircraft to land. According to the Bulgarian version, the Constellation appeared to comply before turning south toward Greece.

The order was then given to shoot it down.

Pini Ben-Porat: The pioneer in the cockpit

Among the men in the cockpit was First Officer Pinchas “Pini” Ben-Porat, one of the pioneers of Israeli aviation. Born Pinchas Anchipolovsky in Ukraine in 1914, he immigrated to Mandatory Palestine as a child and became a pilot in the Palmach’s Palavir.

In December 1947, before the State of Israel came into existence, Ben-Porat flew a light aircraft to the besieged Nevatim settlement, removed one of its doors and carried out an improvised attack with a gunner and hand grenades – an early example of Israeli close-air support. He later flew during the War of Independence, commanded the Israel Air Force’s 69 Squadron and became the first Israeli instructor at the IAF flight academy before joining El Al in 1950.

The captain was Stanley Reginald Hinks, a veteran of the Royal Air Force’s Transport Command. A later British submission to the International Court of Justice described him as a reliable officer and an “above-average pilot with a high sense of duty.”

For El Al, then only six years old, the disaster was unprecedented. In its July 28 edition, the Post noted that it was “the first time in El Al’s history that one of its passenger planes had crashed.” Days later, the airline said it was proud of the “unblemished record of safety” maintained by its crews over millions of miles.

The first Bulgarian explanations only deepened the anger. Sofia initially said that anti-aircraft gunners had brought down the aircraft after it entered Bulgarian airspace without warning, while Israel demanded access to the crash site and sent an investigative mission led by El Al operations chief Yoel Palgi.

The three-man team was eventually allowed into Bulgaria, but only for six hours. In a story published on August 1, The Jerusalem Post reported that after returning to Athens, Palgi said the investigators had seen “charred debris of the Constellation scattered over a wide area of a hill,” but accused Bulgarian officials of removing material connected to the passengers.

“We were received most coldly by the Bulgarians, who during our six-hour stay offered us just one glass of water,” he said.

Israel brought the El Al case to the International Court of Justice

The mission concluded that the aircraft had been brought down by two fighters rather than ground fire. Bulgarian authorities revised their account days later, admitting that two MiG jets had attacked Flight 402 and that their pilots had been “too hasty.”

Sofia expressed regret, promised to punish those responsible and offered compensation, while continuing to blame the aircraft for penetrating deep into its territory.

In Israel, the language was far less restrained. On August 5, the Post published a press review under the title “The El Al Murder,” describing the shooting as a “brutal” act and warning against allowing Bulgarian explanations to obscure what had happened.

Five days earlier, on July 31, another archive page had appeared beneath the heading “Nation Mourns Air Victims,” capturing the scale of the shock in a country whose national airline had until then never suffered such a loss.

The dispute continued long after the wreckage had been cleared. Israel brought the case to the International Court of Justice, arguing that Bulgaria was responsible for the destruction of an innocent civilian aircraft.

In May 1959, the court ruled that it did not have jurisdiction to decide the dispute; it made no judgment on the lawfulness of the attack itself. A compensation agreement was finally reached in 1963, with Bulgaria agreeing to pay $195,000 for the 22 Israeli victims, although the settlement did not cover the loss of the aircraft.

The dead were buried in a common grave at Kiryat Shaul Cemetery in Tel Aviv. A year after the disaster, a new moshav in southern Israel was named Nir Hen: “hen,” the Hebrew letters het and nun, has the numerical value of 58.

Even some of the mail which was carried aboard Flight 402 survived the fire and impact. When it eventually reached Israel, it was marked with a simple Hebrew stamp: “This piece of mail survived in El-Al airplane that was shot down over Bulgaria on 27.7.55.”

Seventy-one years later, it remains one of the darkest surviving descriptions of what happened in the skies above Petrich.

This post was originally published on here. 

The Supreme Court ruled that the Palestinian Authority cannot require terror victims seeking compensation to prove a disability that has already been officially recognized, the prosecution announced Monday.

The court rejected two appeals filed by the PA – and upheld the attorney-general’s position – that an existing disability determination by the National Insurance Institute (NII) or by a court must be accepted in a subsequent compensation claim.

The ruling concerns a law that took effect in June 2024, which allows victims left with a permanent disability from a terrorist attack to seek fixed exemplary damages from the PA on the grounds that it provides payments to terrorists and their families.

The damages are intended not only to compensate victims, but also to punish and deter the PA.

In one of the cases, a victim of terrorism had been found by NII medical committees to suffer from a psychological disability. In the second, relatives of a person murdered in an attack had previously been recognized by a court as indirect victims in a civil lawsuit against the attackers.

Terror-related disabilities only need to be proven once

Lower courts rejected the PA’s attempts to reopen those findings. The PA then appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that it should be allowed to submit evidence challenging the earlier disability determinations.

Supreme Court President Isaac Amit, joined by Justices Yael Willner and Gila Canfy-Steinitz, rejected that argument.

The court said the wording of the law was clear: Once a permanent disability has been established by the NII or in a separate civil case arising from the same attack, the victim does not need to prove it again.

The law does not include any provision allowing the PA to present evidence contradicting an existing disability finding, the court said. That omission was deliberate and reflected the law’s aim of providing terror victims with an efficient compensation process without repeated litigation.

The court also noted that the amount awarded under the law does not change according to the severity of the disability. The relevant question is simply whether the victim has a permanent disability or not.

Amit acknowledged that the law was highly unusual within Israeli civil law, but said its language was unambiguous and that lower courts had applied it correctly.

This post was originally published on here. 

Ukraine wants a prototype for a European anti-ballistic system codenamed Freyja to be ready within the first half of next year, a senior official said, as Kyiv pushes its allies to help deliver a weapon capable of downing Russian missiles.

Davyd Aloian, deputy secretary of Ukraine‘s National Security and Defense Council, who oversees the Freyja project, said that an international steering committee tasked with estimating the research and development costs was due to convene for the first time soon.

Leaders from 10 European countries, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, as well as around a dozen defense manufacturers, gathered at a summit in Paris two weeks ago to officially launch the anti-ballistic coalition.

“Since we’re working within such a tight timeframe, we have an ambitious goal: to have an MVP (minimum viable product) ready by the first half of next year,” Aloian said.

“That is a prototype that can already demonstrate its first practical results.”

Ukraine dependent on US Patriot air defenses

Ukraine is chronically dependent on US-made Patriot air defense systems, which is the only weapon in its arsenal capable of reliably downing Russia’s ballistic missiles, which travel at several times the speed of sound.

Supplies of Patriots have been affected by political volatility, low stocks, and a lengthy production cycle.

Russia has stepped up its ballistic strikes on the capital Kyiv and southern port hub of Odesa this month, launching dozens of missiles, most of which Ukraine was unable to down due to a lack of interceptors.

Ukraine is ready to provide the Freyja project with a launcher and an interceptor missile, which Zelensky described this month as just a “matter of testing.” The Ukrainian leader has said he hopes to see the system operational within a year.

Kyiv expects its allies to contribute technology, such as modern radars, sensors, and expertise on missile guidance and control electronics. The defense companies that have joined the effort so far include Eurosam, which manufactures the SAMP-T interceptor system, as well as Leonardo, Thales, and Saab.

Ukrainian missile and drone manufacturer Fire Point, which developed the Flamingo cruise missile, has said it will be the lead industrial partner on the project. It announced a deal with German defense manufacturer Hensoldt to provide radar for the project last month.

Freyja is an attempt to build a lower-cost alternative to ‌the Patriot, which many European countries also rely on. Other air defense systems, such as Franco-Italian SAMP/T and German IRIS-T, have not yet proven capable of downing ballistic missiles.

Freyja defense coalition seeks to develop interchangeable system parts

Zelensky compared the Freyja coalition to Lego – slotting together pieces of equipment from defense industry leaders.

Manufacturers have been tasked with developing a framework for a system with interchangeable parts, Aloian explained.

“The overall logic of this system is that it’s an open architecture,” he said. “So if Denmark says ‘I want the Freyja system with a Danish-made Weibel radar,’ that’s fine. If Sweden says they want the Saab system, that’s no problem either.”

Setting up a special body, potentially a fund, to channel all contributions and to ensure stable financing for the project is one of the ideas being considered, Aloian said.

He also hopes that businesses being directly involved in the project alongside governments will help to reduce red tape.

“The coalition should be practical rather than political.”

This post was originally published on here. 

The UK’s Islamic Center of England charity has been granted the right to sponsor visas for skilled workers and religious ministers to immigrate to Britain, despite allegations that it is tied to Iran’s regime, The Telegraph reported on Sunday.

The charity has previously been accused of having ties to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and has been formally reprimanded for posting video clips calling for Israel’s destruction.

In a statement to the Telegraph, the center stated that it was “not an official office or representative of any government, political entity, or individual.

“Like many charities, faith organizations and other eligible institutions in the UK, the center holds a Home Office sponsor license, which allows it to sponsor skilled workers where it meets the requirements of the UK’s immigration system,” a spokesperson stated.

“We recognize that questions have previously been raised about the center and its perceived relationship with the Iranian government. The center has consistently maintained that it is an independent UK charity and carries out its activities in accordance with UK law and its charitable objectives.”

Home Office confirms Islamic Center will face consequences if wrongdoing found

A spokesperson for Britain‘s Home Office stated that the center would face consequences if any wrongdoing was discovered.

“The Islamic Center of England has not sponsored any workers since 2022, and the Charity Commission is currently investigating this organization.

“We treat the threat posed by the Iranian regime and those who do its bidding with the utmost seriousness. That’s why we have fast-tracked a change in the law to outlaw support for the IRGC, equipping the police and intelligence service with more powers to disrupt those working on their behalf, and making it easier to prosecute them.

“If wrongdoing is uncovered, those responsible will face the full force of the law, with the possibility of lengthy prison sentences, loss of licenses and further civil action.”

This post was originally published on here. 

Residents of Sderot have received letters from the National Insurance Institute (NII) over the past few days demanding they repay aid funds provided after the October 7 massacre, claiming that residents had used the funds unlawfully.

The issue drew public attention after Sderot Regional Council member Eliran Gerbi revealed in a social media post that he had received dozens of inquiries from residents who had been ordered to repay the money.

They are “devastated and do not know what to do,” according to Gerbi. 

NII said the funds were intended for rehabilitation and treatments but were instead used for “prohibited purchases,” including airline tickets and mobile phones.

“The National Insurance Institute contacted approximately 2,700 victims of terrorism and requested financial reimbursement for the purchase of airline tickets, smartphones, portable speakers, and similar items using money designated for alternative treatments, totaling approximately NIS 15 million,” NII said in a statement.

Further, the statement noted that “since October 7, approximately 86,000 civilians in Israel have been recognized as victims of terrorism.”

NII identifies criminals committing fraud

“At the beginning of the war, as part of the immediate assistance provided and before disability percentages were determined, the National Insurance Institute reimbursed alternative treatments intended for rehabilitation, including acupuncture, surfing, therapeutic horseback riding, tui na, and other treatments,” NII added.

NII stressed that the complementary treatments eligible for reimbursement appeared on a defined list published on its website and in the claim form submitted and signed by each recipient.

The institute also said it had identified criminal actors who had promoted fraudulent schemes by approaching victims of terrorism and offering to falsify receipts in exchange for payment. Those fraudulent receipts were then submitted to the NII.

According to the institute, among the hundreds of thousands of valid receipts it reimbursed victims of terrorism for, approximately 2,700 people submitted improper receipts totaling more than NIS 15 million.

This post was originally published on here. 

An IDF soldier was documented vandalizing cars belonging to Palestinians during operations in Bethlehem over the weekend, according to footage published on Monday morning by Army Radio. 

According to the report, the soldier punctured the tires, kicked the doors and mirrors, smashed the windshields, and slammed his weapon against the windows to break them. 

At least three other soldiers witnessed the acts, Army Radio said, noting that none attempted to stop the vandal.

The military confirmed that the incident had taken place overnight between Saturday and Sunday, Army Radio added, and that it “viewed the acts with severity.”

Further, it told Army Radio that the Etzion Regional Brigade has opened an investigation into the incident, though it refused to detail if any steps had been taken against those involved.

פרסמנו אצל @efitriger

לאחר הפיגוע בשומרון: כוח צה”ל תועד משחית רכבים פלסטינים במהלך פעילות מבצעית בבית לחם

חייל צה״ל שהיה בפעילות מבצעית בבית לחם – תועד כשהוא משחית במכוון מכוניות של פלסטינים: מנקב את הצמיגים, בועט בדלתות ובמראות, מנתץ את השמשות, ומטיח את נשקו בחלונות כדי… pic.twitter.com/OFGEbwJsqh

— דורון קדוש | Doron Kadosh (@Doron_Kadosh) July 27, 2026

Incident follows trend of nationalist crime in West Bank

In a separate incident, a mosque in the West Bank village of Kusra was set on fire on Saturday night, in what is suspected to be a nationalist crime in response to the deadly attack that occurred the day earlier.

The words “Revenge for Benayahu,” one of the victims killed in Friday’s terror attack, were spray-painted on the entrance wall alongside a Star of David.

In addition, five vehicles were set ablaze in the village of Beitillu. Near Khirbat Abu Falah, tractors and trucks were also torched. Two Palestinians who were apparently beaten during the incident were evacuated from the scene to a hospital for medical treatment.

The incidents came two days after Benayahu Mellet, a member of the local emergency response squad and the agriculture coordinator at Gilad Farm, was murdered in a shooting attack near the outpost on Friday. Maj. Yuval Ezra, 27, from Herzliya, a battery commander in the Artillery Corps, was also killed in the same incident.

Amir Bohbot contributed to this report.

This post was originally published on here. 

Watch this episode without interruptions.

Every method of encryption in use today is living on borrowed time.

That was the message from Prof. Maj.-Gen. (res.) Isaac Ben-Israel, among the founders of Israel’s modern cybersecurity apparatus, former head of the Israel Space Agency and head of several programs at Tel Aviv University, speaking to the Jerusalem Post Podcast as part of a series on cyber warfare and artificial intelligence.

“No matter what password you use, in a fraction of a second I will break it,” he said, describing what a mature quantum computer will do to the protections that banks, governments, and militaries rely on.

Why quantum breaks everything

Ordinary computers run on transistors that hold either a one or a zero. Quantum computers exploit the fact that a particle can occupy two states, or two places, at once, which means, Ben-Israel explained, that a calculation which would take a conventional machine a year, or a thousand years, could be finished almost instantly.

He is not talking about being 100 or 1,000 times faster. He put the gap at something closer to 10 to the power of 20 or 30, a number, he noted, that we all know how to write down and none of us can really picture.

Quantum computing does not make hackers better at breaking in. It destroys the encryption protecting what they find once they are inside. The brute-force attack, trying every possible combination of digits, letters, and symbols until the password falls, becomes trivial.

Quantum communication vs. quantum computing

There are two completely separate areas of quantum theory where people are making big strides. One is quantum communication, which means sending signals from space to Earth in a different kind of encryption, and the other is quantum computing. 

When exploring the field of quantum communication, there are a few aspects that need to be considered.

The first fix is new mathematics: post-quantum algorithms that even a quantum machine cannot crack in reasonable time. A few already exist, Ben-Israel said, but they are slow, and none are ready for wide use. According to the professor, they will likely be adapted very slowly, as industry experts expect around a 10-year lag for adopting the new encryption.

The second is stranger, and in his view, where the world will eventually end up. Quantum entanglement allows something done on one computer to register on another, however far away, with nothing traveling in between: no wire, no Wi-Fi, no signal moving at the speed of light. There is nothing to intercept, and no password to steal.

China has already put a satellite in orbit that sends messages to the ground this way. Tel Aviv University students launched a satellite two years ago as an early step toward the same goal. Ben-Israel, who recently co-wrote a book on the philosophical puzzle quantum theory presents, conceded the physics is hard to accept. “Technically, it works, even if you have difficulty understanding how it works.”

How long?

Ben-Israel’s estimate: roughly ten years to solve the main obstacle, which is interference between the quantum elements. The more you add, the worse it gets.

But he was careful about what “ready” means. These will be enormous machines, kept in ultracold conditions, drawing so much electricity that big tech companies are already investing in nuclear power to feed them and their AI systems. “There will be no more than a few in the world. It’s not something you can buy and put on your desk.” A quantum computer in every home, he said, is more than 50 years away, if ever.

From a 1992 unit to Netanyahu’s desk

Ben-Israel initiated what would today be called the IDF’s offensive cyber unit in 1992, which he believes was the first of its kind anywhere. For years the field stayed inside intelligence circles, unmentionable in public.

Stuxnet changed that. Being a highly sophisticated, state-sponsored computer worm, considered the world’s first true digital weapon, it was designed by the US and Israel to sabotage Iran’s nuclear program. 

His answer was not technology or a new agency. It was that Israel had to come out of the closet, to build an ecosystem spanning the security establishment, academia, education, and industry. Netanyahu took some convincing.

The closer, oddly, was a novel: a cyber-war thriller by French-Jewish author Philippe Goldstein in which a conflict between China and Taiwan spirals toward world war. Netanyahu initially refused to read fiction. Ben-Israel suggested he take it on a flight to London to meet the British prime minister. He came back and appointed him head of the National Cyber Initiative.

Once it became known that Iran’s centrifuges had been wrecked by manipulating the computers controlling their rotation, the cyber attack went public, and then-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked Ben-Israel what could be done to protect Israel.

Cyber and AI in the Iran war

Both were used heavily against Iran, Ben-Israel said. Intelligence today sits on computers, so hacking those computers is intelligence work. If media reports are accurate, one method used to time a strike on Iran’s senior leadership involved breaking into the systems that control traffic cameras at Tehran junctions and tracking license plates to determine when the targets were all in one place.

Other operations caused physical damage rather than stealing data: The Stuxnet model. Many Iranian missiles and drones were intercepted far from Israel’s borders using interceptors, electronic warfare, and, where the vehicles had onboard computers and communications, hacking. The Hezbollah pager operation, he said, was the clearest example of what became possible: “the imagination is the limit.”

AI did the work no human team could. Iran is vast, and a ballistic missile launcher can fire from anywhere. Combining satellite imagery meter by meter would take thousands of analysts thousands of years. A model trained to recognize launchers does it in a fraction of a second. The five-minute alerts Israelis received before the sirens, he said, would not have been possible without it. “It saves a lot of lives.”

Israel started late on AI

Ben-Israel was blunt about a failure. He co-headed a national AI initiative with the same mandate he had been given on cyber: get Israel into the world’s top five. Some 300 people worked on the report, submitted in 2019.

Its funding was delayed for years as the government fell and an interim government could not approve a new budget. He was told to wait two months for elections. Then it happened again, and again. Successive governments supported the plan: “It’s not a political issue; everyone supports it,” and none lasted long enough to budget it.

Meanwhile, every other government on earth started sprinting. Israel had a head start in 2018-19 and lost it in several areas. A new body now exists under a former military intelligence official, which Ben-Israel welcomes, though he says it still lacks the money.

He also has little patience for the argument that Israel should pick its niches because it lacks the land and resources for large data centers. There are many excuses for not starting, he said, and that is one of them. Choosing priorities is fine and necessary, but it requires a program.

“I would like to see you starting and running very fast.”

This post was originally published on here. 

A woman in Jerusalem was indicted after allegedly injecting unspecified dangerous substances into her five-year-old son while he was in the hospital, Israel Police announced on Monday.

The child had been admitted to the hospital under suspicion of having drunk cleaning fluid, after which hospital staff noticed a deterioration in his condition, the police stated.

After an initial investigation, the 23-year-old mother was found to have given her son hazardous substances, causing a severe decline in his health.

According to the police, the mother is suspected of having taken similar action in the past, giving her son medications that caused his hospitalization.

Har Homa caregiver arrested under suspicion of abusing toddlers

Last month, a 49-year-old caregiver from the Har Homa neighborhood of Jerusalem was arrested on suspicion of abusing and neglecting two toddlers under her care.

The complaint alleged that the caregiver “shouted and cursed at the toddlers, and in some cases even ignored their crying and needs while they were in her care.”

This post was originally published on here. 

A fire encompassing two factories in Sderot, one belonging to Strauss and another to Tapugan, led to a feared ammonia leak which was later ruled out, Israel’s Fire and Rescue Authority announced on Monday morning.

The Fire and Rescue Authority also stated that rescue forces were on the scene and that there were no reported injuries.

“There are currently 13 fire crews working at the scene, with assistance from forces from other districts, and additional forces are on their way to the scene,” the Fire and Rescue Authority announced. “Firefighters are continuing to work to treat the leak and the main areas of the fire.”

Later, the Fire and Rescue Authority announced that there were 25 crews working on the scene. There were also reports that two planes had been dispatched to assist in controlling the fire.

Israel Police also announced that their forces were on the scene, stating that they were working to block roads and direct traffic in order to protect the public.

The Sderot municipality instructed residents of the nearby neighborhood to remain indoors and keep their windows shut.

The Environmental Protection Ministry confirmed that there was no risk of a hazardous chemical leak, stating that it was in contact with rescue forces on the scene.

Strauss confirms no injuries in fire, says snack production continuing as planned

“A fire broke out in a warehouse complex in the Shaar Negev industrial area near Sderot, where the Strauss salty snack warehouse is also located,” a Strauss spokesperson stated.

“The warehouse has been evacuated, there are no injuries, and there are no hazardous materials in the warehouse. The salty snack factory is far from the fire area. Production is continuing as usual at this time, so no shortage of products is expected.”

Strauss, also known as Strauss-Elite, is one of Israel’s largest food companies, while Tapugan manufactures frozen potato products.

This post was originally published on here. 

At least three people were killed, and four were wounded during a shooting at Seattle Center in the early morning hours on Monday, according to The Seattle Times, citing the Seattle Fire Department.

Local media had earlier reported that there were two deaths and five wounded, including a two-year-old girl, a 23-year-old man, a 39-year-old woman, a 40-year-old woman, and a 56-year-old woman are among the wounded and were transported to the hospital. 

Seattle Assistant Police Chief Tyrone Davis said one of the victims at the hospital did not survive their wounds, bringing the death toll to three. He added that the four others in the hospital were now in stable condition.

Seattle’s Harborview Medical Center told CNN that it is receiving and treating victims of the shooting.

Multiple gunshots were heard at the site at around 6 p.m. local time on Sunday at the Bite of Seattle food festival. Davis announced that one suspect has been taken into custody while another remains at large, as of 10:50 p.m. local time. 

The Seattle Police Department stated that officers responded to the scene and are investigating the incident after recovering two guns in the area. They are advising all residents to avoid the area.

In a joint media conference with Wilson and Governor of Washington Bob Ferguson, Davis said the two suspected gunmen appeared to be firing at each other, and the detained suspect is currently being interviewed. 

Asked whether the gang unit had been called in, he said several detectives, including homicide and gun violence reduction units, were on scene.

“Right now, we believe that we have no outstanding threat to the community,” Davis said.

A Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) spokesperson told ABC News that the agency has been made aware of the shooting.

Police are investigating a shooting. Multiple shooting victims. Shots fired at the Seattle Center. More information to come. Please avoid the area.

— Seattle Police Department (@SeattlePD) July 27, 2026

‘Pure chaos’: One in custody after Seattle shooting 

One witness, who was attending the festival with his girlfriend, told The Seattle Times that he saw several victims on the ground and a body covered with a yellow sheet.

“It was just pure chaos,” the witness said, describing that after the gunshots began, festival attendees began trying to escape to safety.

Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson released a statement shortly after the incident, calling the Seattle Center shooting an “act of horrific violence.”

“No one should have to weigh the risk of being shot before attending an event, gathering with friends, or experiencing their city,” she added. “Gun violence changes families forever. Its trauma reaches far beyond the people struck by bullets. In the days ahead, we will establish what happened and be transparent with the public about what we have learned.”

Washington Congresswoman Rep. Pramila Jayapal stated that she is closely monitoring the situation and has been in close contact with Wilson, as coordination with police continues.

“We ask that the public please stay away from the Seattle Center as there is still an active investigation happening at this time. We will provide updates as we have additional information,” Jayapal emphasized in a statement released on X/Twitter.

Ferguson also released a statement on X/Twitter, saying he’s being briefed on the tragedy and that a SWAT team is on the way to the scene to assist. 

Reuters contributed to this report.

This post was originally published on here. 

US President Donald Trump halted strikes against Iran as the question of the US’s declining munitions stock and its impact on the war has become widely debated, the Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday night, citing US officials familiar with the matter.

Trump over the weekend decided not to renew its strikes, despite military plans to launch a large-scale offensive that could have lasted up to two weeks, according to the officials.

The officials added that Trump could still order an attack on Iran, noting that “the situation remains fluid.”

In a statement made to the Wall Street Journal, Trump denied the claims that munitions shortages were behind his decision to halt strikes against Iran after 13 consecutive days of bombing.

“We have far more munitions than anyone in the world, and far more than we need,” he asserted.

Dan Caine, Brad Cooper believe renewed Iran strikes could happen

However, according to the officials, other top US officials have said otherwise. 

Officials told the Wall Street Journal that while US Joint Chiefs Chairman General Dan Caine is concerned about the declining inventory, he believes that a munitions shortage would pose an added risk should strikes against Iran resume, rather than completely hindering an operation.

Several other officials quoted by the Wall Street Journal added that US Central Command (CENTCOM) Commander Adm. Brad Cooper thinks in a similar vein. 

According to the officials, Cooper believes that the US would be able to deal with a munitions shortage if strikes resume because any American attacks – if approved – would significantly damage Iran’s missile-launching capability.

The Wall Street Journal added that the White House has said that news agencies reporting accurate numbers on the US’s munitions stockpile would be a national security risk. 

A diminished munitions inventory creates a “near-term risk” in case of larger global conflict, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing an April report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. 

“A war against a capable peer competitor like China will consume munitions at greater rates than in this war,” it went on.

US continuing diplomatic talks, prepared for military option

On Saturday, sources familiar with the administration’s decision-making process told The Jerusalem Post that Trump has not yet made a final decision on whether to launch a major strike against Iran.

As the president said on Friday, the United States is continuing diplomatic talks with Tehran while keeping the military option fully prepared.

“We’re locked and loaded,” Trump said, adding that Washington could escalate its military campaign “to a much higher level” if necessary, but that his preferred option remains a negotiated agreement.

Idan Kweller, Tzvi Jasper, Yonah Jeremy Bob, and Jerusalem Post Staff contributed to this report.

This post was originally published on here. 

An IDF soldier was found lifeless on Sunday evening at a base in central Israel, the military confirmed to The Jerusalem Post on Monday.

Military Police have opened an investigation into the incident and will pass their findings on to the Military Advocate-General’s Office for review once completed, the IDF noted.

The military informed the soldier’s family, noting that it shares their grief and will “continue to support them.”

The military has not provided any additional details at the time of writing.

This is a developing story.

This post was originally published on here. 

President of the Palestinian National Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, called for urgent international action to stop Israeli settler violence in the West Bank and “ongoing Israeli military aggression” in a statement shared Sunday.

In his statement on X/Twitter, Abbas said settler violence has gone beyond a few isolated incidents, labeling it a systemic Israeli policy issue. He went on to say the recurring issues have become an effort to undermine the Palestinian National Authority and jeopardize the prospect of a two-state solution.

Abbas named property destruction, the defacement of religious and agricultural sites, and “hundreds of civilian casualties” in the fallout from recent escalations in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. 

His statement also confirmed he wrote letters requesting support from Arab world leaders, the European Union, the President of the United Nations (UN) Security Council, and the Secretary-General of the League of Arab States. 

In the letters, Abbas outlined the “legal and moral responsibilities” of international communities to mitigate Palestinian displacement and hold the Israeli government liable. He also cited UN Resolution 2334, which underlines the illegality of Israeli settlements in Palestinian territory, claiming it has been consistently left unenforced.

Israelis, Palestinians clash in West Bank in recent weeks

This statement comes after a new wave of Israeli settler violence in the West Bank. 

On Saturday night, a mosque in the West Bank village of Kusra was set on fire in response to Friday’s deadly attack targeting Benayahu Mellet, an Israeli agriculture coordinator at Gilad Farm, and Maj. Yuval Ezra.

An additional five vehicles were set on fire in the village of Beitillu as tractors and trucks were torched near Khirbat Abu Falah. Two Palestinians were reportedly beaten during the incidents and were subsequently taken to a hospital for medical treatment.

President Abbas urges international action to halt Israeli attacks and settler terrorism: pic.twitter.com/4IJmNbqM15

— State of Palestine (@Palestine_UN) July 26, 2026

The past week has also seen a string of violence against Israelis in the region, including a fire and two stabbings on Thursday. Two Israeli men, including an IDF soldier, were injured in a separate clash on Saturday when a Palestinian man threw rocks and stole a weapon from his targets.

Following the hostile interactions, IDF Central Command Chief Maj.-Gen. Avi Bluth banned Palestinian workers from entering Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria. 

This post was originally published on here. 

Senior military officials have described the situation in the West Bank as “highly volatile and extremely dangerous,” and, amid the escalating tensions, the decision has been made to reinforce forces in the area.

A total of 26 battalions are now operating across the sector, with a security official warning on Sunday that the situation was “a snowball rolling downhill” and cautioned that “it will be difficult to stop.”

According to a senior security official’s assessment, a large-scale operation targeting terrorist infrastructure and incitement is expected to be postponed until after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu‘s visit to the United States. 

The aim is to avoid a scenario in which the Palestinian issue dominates his meeting with US President Donald Trump, instead of the security establishment’s current priorities: Iran, Lebanon, and the Gaza Strip.

For over a week, the IDF has maintained that the incident near Gilad Farm last Saturday, which led to a spike in tensions across the area, was not an act of deliberate arson.

“We have videos and photographs, and we clearly understand what happened. There were two suspects, and the police released them,” a senior officer in the IDF Central Command said

“The fire was caused by a discarded cigarette, and about two hours later it developed into a wildfire.”

Since the incident, numerous clashes have been reported between Israelis and Palestinians, along with a series of violent attacks across the West Bank, during one of which a company commander and a member of a local security squad were killed, while an off-duty IDF soldier was moderately wounded.

Zamir instructs commanders to prevent West Bank escalation

IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Eyal Zamir has instructed commanders to prevent incidents of friction that could further inflame the situation. 

Despite those directives, the security establishment failed to prevent several suspected nationalist crime incidents over the past 48 hours, including the arson of a mosque, buildings, and vehicles.

Despite the diplomatic sensitivity surrounding Netanyahu’s upcoming visit to the United States, the IDF has launched an operation in Nablus to arrest wanted suspects, question detainees, and locate weapons. However, the security establishment assesses that a broader operation will be postponed until after the prime minister returns.

This post was originally published on here. 

A northern Israeli man was arrested for alleged incitement on Sunday, following comments he posted on a video of the Friday terror attack in Gilad Farm, according to Israel Police. 

“They must be hunted down like pigs. God curse you; may not a single pig settler remain,” said the 39-year-old Maghar resident in a post.

An investigation was opened by the Northern District Police after the comment was reported, and a warrant for the man was issued.

The suspect was “arrested on suspicion of publishing incitement to racism, publishing a direct call to commit an act of terrorism, and other offenses,” the police announcement read.

Suspect detained, ammunition, fireworks, cash seized

The suspect’s house was searched, wherein officers seized two M-16 magazines with ammunition, fireworks, and over NIS 100,000 in cash.

The suspect is being questioned, and his detention was extended by a court order until July 28.

This post was originally published on here. 

The government has banned the import of goods that are produced with the use of forced labor, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Sunday.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposal to ban goods tied to forced labor was approved as a “step of major moral, economic, and strategic importance, reinforcing the State of Israel’s commitment to the fight against human trafficking and forced labor, alongside safeguarding the interests of the Israeli economy.”

The directive instructed the Economy and Industry Ministry to establish regulations banning such goods in accordance with standards set by international law.

The Prime Minister’s Office’s National Economic Council has also been instructed to create an enforcement method, to be submitted to the government for approval within 90 days.

The enforcement mechanism would include “the designation of an authorized entity for decision-making, the establishment of professional criteria for identifying products manufactured using forced labor, the creation of a reporting mechanism, and the establishment of appeal and review mechanisms aiming to ensure effective enforcement, certainty for importers, and the preservation of fair trade rules.”

Ban on goods created with forced labor affirms Israel’s commitment to human rights

The statement emphasized the economic impact alongside the moral value of implementing the directive, with the ministry affirming the government’s commitment to human rights values, fair trade, and the strengthening of the Israeli economy. 

According to the announcement, “this move places Israel in line with the world’s leading countries that are taking steps to prevent the entry into markets of products manufactured through the exploitation of human beings, and strengthens Israel’s credibility as a trading partner operating in accordance with international standards.”

Regarding economic impact, the statement says, “It is expected to strengthen the standing of Israeli exporters in international markets, improve Israel’s trade conditions vis-à-vis its key partners, and reduce trade barriers that harm the competitiveness of the Israeli economy.”

This post was originally published on here. 

The wave of WhatsApp account suspensions across Israel over the weekend triggered widespread concern, leaving many users worried that their own accounts could be blocked. 

The Israel Internet Association on Saturday advised WhatsApp users to back up important information stored in the messenger app in case their accounts were suspended as well.

Speaking on 103FM on Sunday, Yonatan Ben-Horin of the Safe Internet Hotline described the reports the organization has received, noting that this past weekend was different than what he was used to seeing.

“Most of the inquiries we usually receive involve reports of harmful content, abusive accounts, or harmful trends on social media,” Ben-Horin said. 

“What happened over the weekend was different. We started receiving small but steady reports of people whose accounts had been suspended after sending an entirely innocent message to a business or someone they wanted to contact.”

WhatsApp account suspensions tied to sending messages to businesses

After looking into the incidents, the organization realized that the connection was in who the messages were being sent to.

“We realized that all of the messages people had sent, completely innocently, were directed to businesses and similar recipients. The recipient wasn’t an unfamiliar number, but rather the business or person the sender was certain they were contacting. What we initially suspected was that many people had simply sent messages to someone who wasn’t already in their contacts.”

“It’s completely crazy because we’re all dependent on WhatsApp to communicate with practically the entire world,” he continued. 

“As the Israel Internet Association, we have established reporting channels with the various platforms. Because so many Israelis were affected by this wave, and because WhatsApp is such an essential tool for all of us, we reached out to Meta. They asked us to compile the numbers of the suspended accounts. Unfortunately, we still haven’t received any answers, and I’m continuing to collect reports from people whose accounts were suspended over the weekend.”

Ben-Horin also stressed the importance of maintaining independent backups.

“It’s always the right thing to back up your information because many people also use WhatsApp as a personal reminder system,” he said. “Any important information should be backed up outside of WhatsApp, not just in Google‘s or Apple’s cloud services. Those daily, weekly, or monthly cloud backups are only relevant to WhatsApp itself.”

This post was originally published on here. 

While the benefits of exclusively breastfeeding an infant have been well studied, a new study has found a link between breastfeeding and childhood allergies, raising new questions over the choice between breastmilk and formula. 

Breastfeeding does undoubtedly have benefits. The World Health Organization calls it “the ideal food for infants,” and recommends that infants be exclusively breastfed until six months old. Breastfeeding has been associated with higher intelligence tests and lower rates of early asthma. 

However, a research team from the University of Toyama, Japan, led by Professor Emeritus Hidekuni Inadera and using data from the Japan Environment and Children’s Study JECS set out to discover if there was any correlation between breastfeeding and food allergies. 

Using JECS data, the research team was able to study the cases of over 88,000 mother-child pairs from Japan, splitting the infants into four groups: those who were exclusively formula fed for six months, those who were breastfed for less than six months, those who were partially breastfed with formula supplementation for six months, and those who were exclusively breastfed (EBF) for six months. 

The children were assessed annually until six years old for caregiver-reported and physician-diagnosed allergies. 

Both benefits and risks found due to exclusive breastfeeding

The study did confirm some of the benefits found in EBF children. Children who were exclusively breastfed were found to have a 37% lower risk of asthma during the first year of life and a 19% lower risk in the second year. 

Additionally, EBF children were found to have reduced risk of allergic rhinoconjunctivitis (similar to hay fever). 

However, the risk of developing food allergies increased significantly. Children who were exclusively breastfed had an 82% higher risk in the first year, 62% at age two, and 54% at age three. After this point, the increased risk gradually weakened. 

Interestingly, this effect difference varied by sex, with increased allergy risk being higher in male children. 

While the correlation between exclusively breastfeeding and higher prevalence of food allergy was found, the researchers did put forth other potential explanations. 

Age of introduction of food affects allergy prevalence 

One such explanation may be the age at which other foods are introduced into an infant’s diet. Previous studies have shown that exposure to common food allergens such as eggs and peanuts between four and six months may help prevent such allergies. 

This phenomenon became well known in Israel due to the decreased number of children with peanut allergies when compared with children of similar ancestry in the UK. 

A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that the early introduction of peanuts, in Israel usually done through the snack food Bamba, made a significant difference when it came to peanut allergies, with infants who started eating it between the ages of four and 11 months having a lower risk. 

This post was originally published on here. 

Ra’am, the party led by MK Mansour Abbas, announced on Sunday that it will hold primary elections for the first time in its history on August 22, during which party members will select its candidates for the Knesset ahead of the next election.

According to the party’s statement, the conference is part of the completion of its organizational preparations and fulfills its constitutional requirements.

The party stated the conference represents a significant organizational and political milestone and comes amid efforts to strengthen the party’s institutions, expand its membership, and deepen its public presence among the various sectors, communities, and regions of Arab society.

Ra’am accuses government of racism

The move is particularly important to Ra’am in light of the difficult circumstances facing Arab society, with the party citing what it described as “the unprecedented racist policies and practices of the Netanyahu-Ben-Gvir-Smotrich government.”

The United Arab List also stressed that it seeks to bring down the current government and replace it with a new one in which the party would be an active partner, working to address the challenges facing Arab society.

Ra’am has become the fourth Israeli party to hold primaries, alongside Yair Golan’s The Democrats, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s Religious Zionist Party, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud.

This post was originally published on here. 

An ancient Cypriot silver Siglos coin dating to the mid-5th century BCE was found at one of Ashdod’s beaches last month, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) announced on Sunday. 

It is the first coin of its kind to ever be discovered in Israel.

The approximately 2,500-year-old coin was located by Ashdod Beaches Department Deputy Director Avi Chaprak during a search to locate objects lost by visitors to the beach.

Upon discovering the coin, Chaprak handed it over to the IAA’s Coin Department, which was able to confirm the rarity of the find.

“At first glance it looked to be made of silver, but a closer examination showed it to actually be of metal that was only plated with silver; a known phenomenon in Cypriot silver coins from this period, given the shortage of silver on the island,” said Yanniv David Levy, researcher and curator at the IAA’s Coin Department.

Minted during Persian Empire’s reign

Researchers were able to pinpoint the origin of the coin to the ancient city of Salamis, located on the east coast of Cyprus. According to Greek mythology, the city was founded by the archer Teucer, the half-brother of Ajax, and a veteran of the Trojan War.

The coin, weighing about 11 grams, was minted during the Persian Empire’s reign in Cyprus.

One face of the coin depicts a left-facing recumbent ram, while its second face features a left-facing ram’s head set within a sunken square frame.

Beside the head is a laurel branch, placed vertically, with three symbols below it, written in what is believed to be the Cypriot syllabic script.

“Coins of this size and value from the Persian period are rare altogether in the archaeological record,” Levy added. “Usually, silver coins of this size were not preserved intact. Over time, they were cut into small pieces, for use as local trade currency.”

“Furthermore, evidence of such use is known mainly from inland sites in Israel. Therefore, the discovery of a complete coin from the coastal area is thus unusual on all accounts, and of special historical importance.”

Coin offers evidence of ancient Cypriot-Israeli trade

Coins from Salamis from the 5th century BCE were circulated throughout the eastern Mediterranean, explained Dr. Evangeline Markou, a senior researcher at the Institute of Historical Research, National Hellenic Research Foundation, and an expert in ancient Cypriot coinage.

Writing from Athens, she noted that even so, “finds with an exact provenance are rarer, and therefore this coin potentially offers significant information about trade ties and movement between Cyprus and the Land of Israel during this period.” 

Levy, representing the Israeli archaeological perspective, agreed with Markou.

“The circumstances of the discovery and the accurate reporting allow us researchers, not only to identify the coin itself, but also to use it as a reliable source of information about economic and maritime ties that existed in this region some 2,500 years ago,” he said.

Chaprak was awarded a certificate of appreciation for reporting the coin and handing it over to the IAA’s Coin Department. 

“I am happy that I was privileged to be part of a discovery of historical value,” said Chaprak. “For me, it was clear that the coin belonged to our collective heritage, so I immediately delivered it to the Israel Antiquities Authority. If through this act I contributed another small piece towards the research and history of the Land of Israel, then that is a great honor for me.”

Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu added that the coin’s discovery on the Ashdod coast is “tangible evidence of the maritime and commercial ties that existed between the Land of Israel and Cyprus some 2,500 years ago.”

“I commend Avi Chaprak,” he said, “who acted responsibly and transferred the coin to the Israel Antiquities Authority.”

“The public’s cooperation in reporting on antiquities makes it possible to preserve the heritage assets that belong to all of us, to deepen knowledge about the country’s past, and to ensure that the finds will be preserved and studied for the benefit of future generations.”

This post was originally published on here. 

The Pentagon designated four soldiers killed in Jordan and Iraq in July as “Overseas Operations Casualties” on Sunday, separate from the other 14 casualties of Operation Epic Fury listed on its website.

Last week, The New York Times had reported that the number of soldiers the Pentagon had confirmed were killed during the war had been reduced, with the four soldiers having been removed from the website. 

The Jerusalem Post confirmed at the time that the numbers online did not mention the four servicemembers killed – including Private Isabella Gonzales, 19, and Lt. Tyler James Feehan, 25, who were killed during an Iranian strike in Jordan – or those who had been wounded since July 1, despite the site having been updated on July 20.

Chief Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell blamed the soldiers’ absence on “a temporary data disruption” in a Thursday post on X/Twitter.

“The Department of War is aware of temporary data disruptions on the Defense Casualty Analysis System (DCAS) website,” he stated. “These site anomalies are currently being resolved in coordination with the Military Services.”

He also accused the NYT of “colluding” with anonymous sources to “push a completely fake story.”

CBS reported that US defense officials had not briefed reporters on Operation Epic Fury since May, and have not commented on the four soldiers’ categorization.

Pentagon wounded US soldier numbers show discrepancies 

The Pentagon’s website also displayed some anomalies in the number of wounded US soldiers, CBS wrote.

Last week, 482 soldiers were listed as having been wounded during the war with Iran. Currently, that number has been reduced to 417, with an additional 207 soldiers listed as having been wounded in “Overseas Operations.”

In the initial report, the NYT claimed that dozens of American soldiers had been wounded and unreported by CENTCOM, as well as damage to several helicopters.

One official told the NYT that CENTCOM is not obligated to reveal information about wounded soldiers, particularly when the soldiers are expected to quickly return to duty, and when doing so could give Iran a tactical advantage in targeting future attacks.

A separate source noted that the US would not share information that could “help Iran zero in on its deadly ballistic missiles and drone attacks in Jordan and other bases in the Middle East.”

This same reasoning is why CENTCOM has stopped confirming how many Iranian targets it has struck each day.

Shir Perets contributed to this report.

This post was originally published on here. 

Violence in the West Bank is, once again, spiraling in multiple directions.

Palestinian terror attacks claimed two Israeli lives and wounded several others. At the same time, extremist Israeli violence once again targeted Palestinian villages, culminating in Sunday’s torching of a mosque in the latest price tag attack.

On Thursday, an Israeli man was seriously wounded in a stabbing attack after attempting to extinguish a fire allegedly set by Palestinian residents of the nearby village of Beit Furik.

Less than 24 hours later, two Israelis were killed after a group of Israeli civilians illegally entered Palestinian Authority-controlled territory while hiking, prompting IDF and local security forces to come to their aid after they were confronted by local Palestinians.

Then, in the early hours of Sunday morning, extremist settlers entered the Palestinian village of Kusra and set fire to a mosque, spraying “revenge for Benayahu” on its entrance – a price tag attack exacting revenge for the murder of Benayahu Melet, an emergency response squad member who was killed while trying to aid the hikers.

All violence demands an uncompromising response

These events are not morally equivalent, but all demand an uncompromising response from Israeli authorities.

The full circumstances surrounding Friday’s deadly clashes remain unclear.

Terrorism cannot and will never be tolerated or justified. But it is equally legitimate to ask whether stronger enforcement against repeated lawlessness in the West Bank could have prevented the violence from escalating.

Israel has both a moral obligation and a legal responsibility to prevent extremist settlers from carrying out price tag attacks.

These crimes undermine the rule of law, inflame tensions on the ground, damage Israel’s international standing, and ultimately put both law-abiding Israelis living in the West Bank and the security forces responding to outbreaks of violence at greater risk.

These attacks would not occur with such frequency if perpetrators believed there was a genuine risk of arrest and prosecution.

In direct response to Friday’s deadly clashes, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz ordered an intensified crackdown across the West Bank, including additional troop deployments, new checkpoints, and expanded counterterrorism operations.

These measures may help restore order and prevent further terrorist attacks. But military operations alone cannot address violence that Israeli law enforcement has too often failed to deter.

Any effort to restore security in the West Bank must include a serious commitment to confronting Jewish extremist violence alongside Palestinian terrorism.

For too long, Israel’s political echelon has been too reluctant to properly condemn and act to suppress settler violence – and we are now bearing witness to the consequences of that reluctance.

Over the past several years, Katz has pushed for policies that critics argue weakened Israel’s efforts to restrain Jewish extremist violence, including ending the use of administrative detention against Jewish suspects while maintaining the practice for Palestinian security detainees.

Whether one agrees with administrative detention as a tool or not, the message such decisions send about unequal enforcement cannot be ignored. These decisions serve as an informal endorsement of Jewish extremist activity, whether intended or not.

Why is Jewish extremist violence treated differently?

The issue also extends beyond the West Bank. Allies that readily recognize Israel’s right and obligation to defend its citizens against terrorism increasingly question why Jewish extremist violence appears to be treated differently.

Israeli security officials have also repeatedly warned that extremist settler violence constitutes a national security concern. Visiting the scene of Friday’s clashes, Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) Director David Zini urged Israelis not to take revenge into their own hands.

We need more of our leaders to say the same.

Too often, members of the political echelon have been reluctant to publicly condemn Jewish extremist violence in the West Bank, fearing political backlash from their own supporters.

At the same time, Palestinian Authority officials and community leaders in the West Bank must do more to condemn and prevent attacks against Israeli civilians and IDF troops.

Every terrorist attack against Israelis deserves an uncompromising response.

So too does every attack carried out by Israelis against innocent Palestinians – attacks that have become increasingly common as extremist settlers have grown more comfortable carrying them out with little apparent fear of consequences.

Israel cannot allow political considerations to determine which forms of extremism it confronts. The rule of law must apply equally, or it will steadily erode for everyone.

This post was originally published on here. 

In preparation for the upcoming elections, which are set for October 27, the Central Elections Committee and the Employment Service announced a joint effort to hire thousands of job seekers for election-related positions on Friday.

Hiring for positions such as polling site staff, technical support workers, logistics personnel, and a variety of other roles will begin in the next week, according to a joint statement released by the committee and the Employment Service.

Both organizations agreed that they intend to hire individuals who represent all segments of the population, with a special emphasis on hiring people with disabilities, people who have been displaced from their homes during the ongoing wars with Iran and Hezbollah, and those who were injured during the wars.

The hiring and recruitment process will be facilitated, in part, at a designated site to be established and jointly managed by the Elections Committee and Employment Service.

Acting Director General of the Central Elections Committee, Attorney Din Livne, emphasized that staff responsible for facilitating elections are essential to the electoral process.

Elections Committee vows to provide Israelis with proper access to voting sites

“We are already working to ensure that every polling station is staffed with professional, skilled, and capable personnel, so that every citizen can exercise their right to vote in a proper, accessible, and reliable manner,” Livne vowed.

Inbal Mashash, the Director General of the Employment Service, highlighted the importance of providing employment opportunities for thousands of job seekers across Israel. 

“A strong labor market and a sound democratic process both rely on broad participation from all parts of society,” Mashash asserted.

“The Employment Service will bring to this effort its expertise, tools, and nationwide presence to quickly identify and place suitable workers in a wide range of positions,” she added.

This post was originally published on here. 

Britain’s new Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, will welcome Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as his first international visitor on Monday, in a move that underscores London’s steadfast support for Ukraine, Burnham’s office said.

The two leaders are expected to meet at a naval base, where they will hear how UK-led training programs are helping strengthen Ukraine’s armed forces and deliver results on the battlefield, according to Downing Street.

“Britain stands with Ukraine, shoulder to shoulder, and our support remains unwavering,” Burnham said in a statement. “Russia should be in no doubt of our resolve, and we will not back down until we achieve long-lasting and just peace for Ukraine.”

During the visit, Burnham and Zelensky will meet more than 200 Ukrainian military personnel and sailors who have spent the past three weeks in Britain taking part in Exercise Sea Breeze, a maritime security and counter-mine exercise designed to prepare participants for future missions in the Black Sea.

Massive support for Ukrainian war effort

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, the UK’s total support for Ukraine has reached £25 billion ($33.3 billion), including £16 billion in military assistance and £5.6 billion in non-military support, Burnham’s office said.

Burnham’s predecessor Keir Starmer visited Kyiv days before he stood down earlier this month, where he pledged €300 million ($345 million) to help equip Ukraine with a squadron of 16 Swedish-made Gripen fighter jets.

This post was originally published on here. 

Ship traffic through Bab el-Mandeb fell on Sunday after Yemeni Houthis attacked Saudi oil installations along the Red Sea coast, while transit through the Strait of Hormuz stayed low over the weekend, shipping data from Kpler showed on Monday.

Eleven commodity vessels passed through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait on Sunday, the lowest level in months, the data showed.

Red Sea traffic has been disrupted off the coast of Yemen since last week by the Tehran-aligned Houthis, who want to blockade Saudi exports, expanding the US-Iran conflict that has already choked oil supply through the Strait of Hormuz.

Seven of the vessels that passed through Bab el-Mandeb were oil tankers, with three of them entering the Red Sea. Two of them are very large crude carriers (VLCCs) heading to the port of Yanbu to load Saudi crude while the third is a Russian-linked ship, the data showed.

The four vessels that exited the Red Sea on Sunday included the Hong Kong-flagged VLCC New Explorer carrying 2 million barrels of Saudi and Emirati crude for eastern China’s Ningbo port, a tanker carrying 1 million barrels of Russian crude for China and a tanker with about 750,000 barrels of Saudi crude onboard for Pakistan, the data showed.

This is the third Chinese VLCC to exit the Red Sea via the Bab el-Mandeb strait. Associated Maritime Hong Kong, the manager for the New Explorer, did not immediately respond to a request for comment outside office hours.

Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said the group struck sites belonging to Saudi state oil company Aramco in the cities of Jizan and Yanbu on Saturday.

Slowed transit in Strait of Hormuz

Fewer than 10 commodity vessels passed through the Strait of Hormuz daily over the weekend even though the US and Iran have paused strikes in the Middle East, shipping data from Kpler showed.

Seven vessels transited on Sunday, including three Iranian-linked oil products tankers that exited the Strait, the data showed.

On Saturday, there were only three vessels that passed through with their transponders switched off. These include a VLCC heading to Qatar to load oil, a liquefied petroleum gas tanker going to the Ruwais port in the United Arab Emirates to load a cargo, and a tanker carrying Qatari naphtha that was heading to Japan, the data showed.

On Friday, seven vessels passed, mostly exiting the Gulf, including two VLCCs carrying crude from Iraq and the UAE and a tanker carrying fuel oil.

This post was originally published on here. 

Toronto Police are investigating suspected antisemitic attacks on Jewish businesses after shattered windows were discovered Sunday morning at two locations of the Jewish-owned Kiva’s Bagel Bar chain.

The damage was discovered when the locations opened Sunday morning and is believed to have occurred overnight between Saturday and Sunday.

At around 8:12 a.m., police received a report that a window had been struck by gunfire at the bakery’s location at Yonge Street and St. Clair Avenue.

Police confirmed that evidence of firearm use was found, including a bullet hole in the business’s front window.

Then at around 8:30 a.m., police were called to another Kiva’s location on Steeles Avenue West near Bathurst Street,  shattered front window was also found there, although police found no evidence of gunfire.

Both locations belong to the same Jewish-owned chain, which is known as a popular gathering place for Toronto’s Jewish community, particularly on Sunday mornings. No injuries were reported in either incident.

Suspected hate-motivated crimes

Police are treating the incidents as suspected hate-motivated crimes and have increased their presence in the area.

No arrests have been made, and the investigation is ongoing.

A police officer who briefed the media said, “We understand that this is a concerning incident for residents and employees in the area, and especially for members of the Jewish community. All resources are available to us to investigate the case thoroughly.”

Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow strongly condemned the attacks, calling them “vile and unacceptable.”

“There is no place for hate in Toronto. I will always stand with the Jewish community against antisemitism,” she said.

Noah Shack, CEO of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA), described the bakery as a “hub” for Jewish families and expressed concern that the incidents could mark an escalation following previous shootings targeting Jewish institutions in the city.

Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar also responded to the attacks on Sunday, stating in a post to X/Twitter “I am following with concern the worrying news from Toronto of further attacks against Jewish businesses this morning.”

I am following with concern the worrying news from Toronto of further attacks against Jewish businesses this morning.

While thankfully none were injured, this is the latest attack in a long and horrifying line of violence and intimidation against the Canadian Jewish community.…

— Gideon Sa’ar | גדעון סער (@gidonsaar) July 26, 2026

“While thankfully none were injured, this is the latest attack in a long and horrifying line of violence and intimidation against the Canadian Jewish community.” He added.

“The Canadian government must confront this antisemitic violent wave!”

This post was originally published on here. 

Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei called for continued jihadist attacks against Israel, while praising the Lebanese terrorist organization Hezbollah in a series of statements attributed to him on Sunday.

In the statements, which were released in response to a Hezbollah letter pledging allegiance to Iran’s Islamic Republic, Khamenei allegedly asserted that “there remains no path forward except jihad and resistance” against the US and Israel.

He continued to claim that Hezbollah’s steadfast commitment to terrorism has “become an inspiring message” for those in pursuit of “liberation from global arrogance” and “divine victory.”

Defense of Hezbollah is Iran’s ‘strategic mandate,’ Khamenei says

Khamenei was also quoted as stating that, in line with policy set by Khamenei’s father and previous supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the defense of Hezbollah is Iran’s “strategic mandate.” 

He also allegedly asserted that Iran’s primary condition for reaching a peace agreement with the US is the halting of all Israeli operations against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.

Khamenei also lamented the killing of former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed by Israeli strikes in 2024. He described Nasrallah as “Hezbollah’s master of martyrs,” crediting him with growing Hezbollah from a “sapling of Islamic resistance into a mighty tree.”

This post was originally published on here. 

Vivian Aisen will serve as Israel’s next ambassador to Colombia following the government’s unanimous approval of her appointment, the Foreign Ministry announced on Sunday.

Aisen, who previously served as ambassador to Macedonia, was appointed as part of Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar’s efforts to renew and restore relations between Israel and Colombia amid warming ties between Israel and Latin American countries.

Aisen also previously headed the Foreign Ministry’s Central America Department and served at Israel’s embassies in London and Chile, as well as at its missions in Brussels and to the European Union.

Me siento profundamente orgullosa y honrada de haber sido aprobada por el Gobierno de Israel para servir como Embajadora de Israel en Colombia.

Vivimos un momento muy especial en las relaciones entre nuestros dos países. Estoy convencida de que trabajaremos juntos por la… pic.twitter.com/m8zrxUkl3A

— Vivian Aisen 🇮🇱 (@VivianAisen) July 26, 2026

“We are living through a very special moment in the relations between our two countries. I am convinced that we will work together for the prosperity of our nations and the well-being of our peoples,” said Aisen in an X/Twitter post, adding that she is “eager and excited at the prospect of soon assuming my duties and representing Israel in Colombia.”

Fully restoring diplomatic relations after severed ties over Gaza

Sa’ar spoke with Colombian president-elect Abelardo de la Espriella and met with Omar Bula Escobar, Colombia’s designated foreign minister, to discuss on the new direction in bilateral relations on July 16.

Colombian President Gustavo Petro severed diplomatic ties with Israel in May 2024 over Israel’s military operations in Gaza.

Israel and Colombia are expected to fully restore diplomatic relations following the inauguration of Colombia’s new president on August 7. The process will include the immediate appointment of ambassadors, the opening of a Colombian embassy in Jerusalem, and a series of additional joint initiatives.

Late last month, lawmakers from Latin American countries signed a resolution supporting the expansion of the Isaac Accords and calling for greater regional cooperation with Israel. The resolution also renewed efforts to encourage additional Latin American countries to move their embassies to Jerusalem.

Representatives from Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela, Ecuador, Colombia, Honduras, Chile, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Paraguay, Uruguay, Bolivia, and Panama participated in the Latin America Chairmen’s Conference in Buenos Aires.

The Foreign Ministry also announced the appointment of Nissan Amdur, who was selected to serve as Israel’s ambassador to Croatia, as the country’s nonresident ambassador to North Macedonia, replacing Aisen.

The appointments were approved by the Ministerial Committee for Appointments in the Foreign Service, chaired by Sa’ar, before receiving final government approval.

Jerusalem Post staff contributed to this report.

This post was originally published on here.