ISSUES

At CUFI, we are focused on several key issues with the goal of defending Israel’s strength, security, and sovereignty.

If you want to keep up with all things Israel, sign up for CUFI’s Daily Briefing – our daily news roundup created exclusively for CUFI members. Every morning, Monday through Friday, receive an email with some of the top headlines in the news so you are always informed and ready to debunk lies with the truth.

Hamas

Netanyahu: Israel Will Restore Quiet to Gaza Border Region ‘in Full’

Israel will restore total quiet its southern region near the border with the Gaza Strip, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed on Sunday.

Speaking at a cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, following a week that saw an outburst of Hamas violence that nearly provoked an all-out war, Netanyahu said, “We are in the midst of a campaign against terror in...

Palestinians load kites and balloons with flammable material in order to fly toward Israel, at the Israel-Gaza border in al-Bureij, central Gaza Strip, on June 14, 2018. (AFP Photo/ Mahmud Hams)
Hamas

Israel said to confiscate tens of thousands of balloons en route to Gaza

In the past several weeks, Israel has prevented tens of thousands of balloons from being shipped to Gaza, out of concern they would be used to launch incendiary devices into Israel, according to a television report on Sunday.

Three shipping containers destined for the coastal enclave and carrying tens of thousands of balloons were stopped at the...

Recognizing unique threats posed by terror groups, IDF drills for reorganization that would dissolve established units into unified fighting force; anti-drone laser also tested
Hezbollah

Preparing for fight against Hezbollah, army tries out combat reshuffle

The military has field-tested a new fighting method combining infantry, tanks and combat engineering into one unified force, as part of a major military reform meant to streamline the Israel Defense Forces, the army said Sunday.

The method was tested during a drill simulating war in the north against the Hezbollah terrorist group, during which...

American and Israeli firefighters in southern Israel, Photo, EVP
Hamas

US Firefighters Join Israelis to Battle Terror Arson Blazes from Gaza

For months, Israeli firefighters have battled arson fires caused by some 1,200 terror attacks. The fires have burned more than 7,500 acres of farmland and nature. Now American volunteers are fighting the flames with them.

Palestinian terrorists are using balloons and kites combined with a summer wind to carry their fire from Gaza to Israel.

In a...

Israeli Embassy to the UK files a formal complaint against broadcaster: "Hamas struck Israel before Israel responded with air strikes."
Hamas

Foreign Ministry Slams BBC ‘MISLEADING’ REPORTING ON GAZA ROCKETS

The Foreign Ministry formally complained to the BBC about its reporting on the violence in the South on Thursday.

A BBC headline stated “Gaza air strikes ‘kill woman and child’ after rockets hit Israel,” quoting the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry. The article’s subheadline said “Militants... fired dozens of rockets,” when the count had gone up to...

Map of Israel and Gaza
Israel Defense Force (IDF)

Israel and Gaza: How did we get here?

For months, there has been an escalation of violence along the security fence between Gaza and Israel, including violent riots and the most serious incident since Operation Protective Edge in 2014. In addition to the riots, Hamas operatives began carrying out a new kind of attack, using arson kites and incendiary balloons to set Israeli land...

What The New York Times Isn’t Telling You About Gaza
Hamas

What The New York Times Isn’t Telling You About Gaza

Sometimes a single sentence in a New York Times article about Israel tells a whole story.

Take, for example, this gem from a dispatch from Jerusalem by Isabel Kershner that appeared in the August 9 New York Times: “A high-level delegation of Hamas officials, including some living in exile, convened in Gaza to discuss Egyptian and United Nations...

Home which was struck by a rocket overnight in Yad Mordechai. (photo credit: TAMARA ZIEVE)
Hamas

Residents of Gaza Border Communities Fatigued By Endless Cycle of Violence

She was packing her belongings from her rocket-ravaged home, preparing to decamp from Kibbutz Yad Mordechai to stay with relatives in the center of the country, when we knocked on her door Thursday afternoon. Still she invited us in and offered us a cold drink.

The kibbutznik whose house suffered a direct hit by a Qassam in the middle of the...

Bar-Ilan researcher working to commercialize her formula that protects against and treats diseases from trypanosomes transmitted by biting flies.
Israeli Technology

Nanodrug tames leishmaniasis and other parasitic diseases

Before a sandfly bites, she doesn’t buzz like a mosquito. The beige insect swoops in silently, and only when the itching begins do you know you’ve been her victim. Usually the bite is just an uncomfortable annoyance.

However, more than 90 sandfly species are known to transmit trypanosome parasites called Leishmania. A small fraction of people...

Hamas

Between Ceasefire and War: Gaza on a Knife’s Edge

It is perhaps unique to this context that both sides of the current flare-up—the Israeli army and Hamas, the terrorist group that controls the Gaza Strip—can simultaneously escalate their attacks on each other while negotiating a delicate ceasefire.

Such has been the case in recent days, leaving many on both sides wondering if the heavier blows...

Security cabinet huddles over Gaza Strip violence, ceasefire with Hamas
Hamas

Security cabinet huddles over Gaza Strip violence, ceasefire with Hamas

The top-level security cabinet met on Sunday to discuss the ongoing Gaza Strip violence and the military options available, hours after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made it clear that Israel wants a full ceasefire and nothing less.

Netanyahu met with his senior ministers at the military headquarters in Tel Aviv. The meeting came as the...

Patient Receives New Knee Made From Coral, Thanks to Israeli Startup Company
Israeli Technology

Patient Receives New Knee Made From Coral, Thanks to Israeli Startup Company

Israel has just completed its first successful knee surgery using a coral-based implant invented by an Israeli startup.

Earlier this month, a 30-year-old patient who had undergone several unsuccessful knee surgeries in the past received an Agili-C implant at Hadassah University Medical Center on Jerusalem’s Mount Scopus campus, created by the...

New ‘Jerusalem’ neighborhood of Guatemala rises from ashes
Israeli Society

New ‘Jerusalem’ neighborhood of Guatemala rises from ashes

Thousands of Guatemalans lost their homes to the Volcán de Fuego (“Volcano of Fire”) in early June. One hundred new houses for refugees are now being built thanks to a charitable initiative spearheaded by the Central American country’s rabbi in his capacity as head of the Guatemalan branch of Israeli search-and-rescue and victim identification...

Israeli Technology

New laser solution could slow spread of forest fires

Aggressive wildfires are rampaging through many countries this summer, bringing death and destruction in their wake. In California alone, firefighters are scrambling to control 18 separate blazes.

Texas, Oregon, Florida, New Jersey, as well as Canada, Greece, India, Mexico, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and the UK are among other areas battling massive...

Stefan Abrahamsson announced Thursday on Facebook that his yacht, Elida, will set sail from Sweden on Aug. 25 to Israel to show solidarity with the Jewish state and Middle East Christians.
Hamas

Swedish Christian Zionists to Sail to Israel on Solidarity Mission

Following Swedish pro-Palestinian activists’ failed attempt to reach Gaza by sea, a Christian supporter of Israel from Sweden announced he would take dozens of pro-Zionists to Israel on his yacht.

Stefan Abrahamsson announced Thursday on Facebook that his yacht, Elida, will set sail from Sweden on Aug. 25 to Israel to show solidarity with the...

Huge incendiary kite from Gaza lands on kibbutz power lines
Hamas

Huge incendiary kite from Gaza lands on kibbutz power lines

 

A large incendiary kite launched from Gaza landed on power lines near Kibbutz Sufa, sparking a quick operation by employees from the Israeli Electric Corporation to remove the device before a fire was started.

The 4-meter (about 13-foot) kite, which landed on Friday, caused a power outage at the kibbutz and in the surrounding area.

It...

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (R) and Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman (2nd-L) meet with top IDF generals and Israeli security officials at the military's Kirya headquarters in Tel Aviv on August 9, 2018. (Ariel Hermoni/ Defense Ministry)
Iran

When weighing Gaza actions, ministers reportedly looked to Iran threat in north

A leading consideration as top ministers deliberated Thursday how to respond to ongoing rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip was the need to focus on the northern border with Syria and the Iranian threat emanating from there, Channel 10 news reported Friday.

According to the TV report, ministers at the emergency security cabinet meeting were...

Ten Months On, Palestinian School Built With Belgian Aid Still Named After Terrorist Who Massacred 38 People
Incitement

Ten Months On, Palestinian School Built With Belgian Aid Still Named After Terrorist Who Massacred 38 People

A Palestinian school built with support from Brussels still bears the name of a mass-murdering terrorist and continues to display a plaque with the Belgian flag.

The elementary school in the West Bank was gifted to the Palestinian Authority in 2013 and subsequently renamed in honor of Dalal Mughrabi — a Palestinian nationalist who in 1978 helped...

Hamas

Senior Israeli officials deny existence of ceasefire with Hamas

A senior diplomatic official told Israeli television Friday that Hamas’s announcement of a ceasefire with Israel following a major flareup between the sides was a lie.

Speaking with Hadashot TV news, the unnamed Israeli official insisted Israel never agreed to a ceasefire, which Hamas announced late Thursday and said went into effect at midnight....

Talking Points

Talking Points – 9th August 2018

 

For weeks we have heard that the leadership of the Israel Defense Forces was concerned that Hamas would soon escalate the violence from Gaza into a full-scale war. Since March, Hamas has incited violent riots along the Gaza border fence and encouraged thousands of Palestinians to attack the IDF. Burning kites and balloons rigged with...