ISSUES

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Hamas

9 rockets fired at border towns; IDF assesses Tel Aviv rocket attack was mistake

The growing assumption among Israeli army officials is that Thursday’s rockets were fired from Gaza toward Tel Aviv by mistake, a defense official said Friday.

Low-level Hamas forces are believed to have been responsible for the launches.

In response to the two rockets fired at Tel Aviv, which did not hit residential areas and caused no direct...

Israel Defense Force (IDF)

IDF hits more than 100 Hamas targets in Gaza after rockets fired at Tel Aviv

Israeli war planes hit over 100 Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip in a night of strikes after two rockets were fired at Tel Aviv for the first time since the 2014 war, the Israel Defense Forces said.

The strikes came after an urgent late night consultation between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his defense chiefs in Tel Aviv. “Decisions were...

Hamas

We thought it was a drill: Rockets shock Tel Aviv, including crowd at a war play

The launch of two rockets toward Tel Aviv Thursday evening that triggered rocket alarms in the city for the first time since 2014 caught residents by surprise, with many saying they had trouble believing it was an actual incident and not a drill or a technical malfunction.

Many residents of Israel’s second-largest city and the surrounding...

Hezbollah

Israel petitions UN Security Council to act on uncovered Hezbollah cell

Israel on Wednesday filed a complaint with the UN Security Council shortly after revealing it had uncovered a terror cell near the border in the Syrian Golan Heights.

“The State of Israel will not ignore the conversion of Syria and Lebanon into a military front against it and will act forcefully and aggressively against Tehran’s aggression,” UN...

Iran

50 Iranian drones conduct massive ‘way to Jerusalem’ exercise – report

Iran’s Defense Ministry announced on Thursday that it had launched a massive drone exercise involving 50 drones that are based on a model of a US Sentinel drone the Iranians captured in 2011. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it was the strongest exercise of its kind to date.

Named “Beit al-Maqdis,” a reference to Jerusalem, the...

Hamas

5 Palestinians arrested after crossing into Israel from Gaza

The Israel Defense Forces early Thursday morning apprehended five Palestinians who crossed the border from Gaza into the country.

The men were arrested at around 2 a.m. after breaching the fence in the south of the Gaza Strip and taken in for questioning, the military said.

In its brief statement, the army did not say that the men were armed.
...

Iran

Intel firm: Satellite images back report of new Iranian missile plant in Syria

New satellite images give credence to reports that a new factory in Syria’s northwest is a facility for the production of surface-to-surface (SSM) missiles, an Israeli intelligence-gathering firm said Wednesday.

ImageSat International (ISI) on Wednesday said satellite photos of the compound supported the report.

“The construction patterns, the...

US-Israel Relationship

US calls Golan ‘Israeli-controlled,’ drops all mention of West Bank ‘occupation’

WASHINGTON — For the first time, the Trump administration referred to the Golan Heights on Wednesday as “Israeli-controlled” and ceased to refer to the West Bank as “occupied” in the State Department’s annual report on human rights around the world.

While last year’s report marked a departure from years of American foreign policy by no longer...

Israeli Society

Netanyahu: Israel is in contact with six ‘important Arab, Islamic countries’

Addressing the state memorial ceremony for former Israeli Prime Minister Levi Eshkol on Tuesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel is in contact with “half a dozen important Arab and Islamic countries."

The ceremony was held at Mount Herzl in Jerusalem, the very same site, Netanyahu pointed out, where Eshkol brought the remains of...

Syria

Iran reviving maritime smuggling route to Syria using civilian firms

An analyst told i24NEWS exclusively on Tuesday that Iranian companies, sanctioned by the United States over ties to the Revolutionary Guards Corps, have recently begun unloading shipments at Syria’s Latakia port raising suspicions that the dormant maritime trade route is being revived and may be exploited for weapons smuggling.

The Mediterranean...

Antisemitism

Middle School Map Shows Israel Labeled As ‘Palestine’

A map that was displayed at a March 7 Georgia middle school multicultural event featured all of Israel labeled as “Palestine.”

The map was part of a table on Palestinian culture at Autrey Mill Middle School’s Multicultural Night in Fulton County; the map was not provided with any sort of context. The Palestinian cultural table also featured a...

Hamas

Senior Hamas member encourages children to join terrorist organizations

A senior Hamas member has encouraged Palestinian children to be martyrs and join terrorist organization in a video published on the Hamas public broadcaster in Gaza.

In the video, published by The Middle East Media Research Institute, shows the Hamas member as saying that they “will teach our kids in the kindergartens, the elementary schools, and...

Hezbollah

IDF says it has exposed new Hezbollah cell operating from Syrian Golan Heights

The Israel Defense Forces said Wednesday that it had exposed a Hezbollah terror cell established in a border village in the Syrian Golan Heights and vowed to prevent the Lebanese group from operating against Israel from Syrian soil.

The IDF said the cell was comprised of Syrians, but led by Lebanese and “masterminded” by a man it identified as...

Terrorism

IDF: Palestinian tries to stab soldiers in Hebron, is shot dead

Israeli soldiers shot dead a Palestinian man as he tried to stab them in the West Bank city of Hebron on Tuesday, the military said.

No servicemen were injured in the incident, the Israel Defense Forces said.

“IDF soldiers spotted the terrorist armed with a knife as he ran toward them. The soldiers pushed the terrorist back as he tried to run...

Incitement

Firebomb thrown at police post on Temple Mount as fresh violence erupts

A firebomb was thrown at a police position on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem on Tuesday, prompting officers to make a number of arrests and close off access to the holy site, which has seen soaring tensions in recent weeks over a long-sealed area.

The police had no comment on any injuries in the attack.

“A short while ago, on the Temple Mount, a...

Hamas

Hamas seems to ready for calm, but will Islamic Jihad cooperate?

Hamas did not stage riots or confrontations along the Israel-Gaza border on Saturday night, for the first in months of nightly incidents at the friction points along the security fence.

Earlier in the day, however, a mortar shell was fired at the Eshkol Regional Council and exploded in an open area; a cluster of balloons carrying the warhead from...

Antisemitism

Brussels Jewish museum killer sentenced to life in prison

BRUSSELS, Belgium — The French jihadist who shot dead four people in a terrorist attack at a Jewish museum was on Tuesday sentenced to life in prison by a Brussels court, after prosecutors branded him a “coward” and a “psychopath.”

Mehdi Nemmouche was convicted last week of “terrorist murder” for the anti-Semitic gun rampage in the Belgian...

US-Israel Relationship

Trump spending cuts leave military aid to Israel untouched

Israel can rest easy: The spending cuts axe being wielded by US President Donald Trump has so far spared military aid to Israel. Israel is due to receive $3.3 billion under the 2020 budget proposal that the White House sent to Congress yesterday.

The aid to Israel is set out in a memorandum of understanding signed by President Obama in his last...

US-Israel Relationship

Graham to push for US to recognize Golan Heights as part of Israel

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Monday told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu he will push for the United States to formally recognize the Golan Heights as part of Israel.

Graham, Netanyahu and U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman together toured the Golan Heights, a slice of territory taken by Israel from Syria in the 1967 Six-Day...

US-Israel Relationship

The pro-Israel blogger conference that has become a support group

Kasim Hafeez, a British Muslim and former Islamist who is now a proud Zionist who stands with Israel, will land in Israel this week for #DigiTell, a gathering of 100 pro-Israel bloggers and social network managers from all over the world.

“We are bringing together those who have fought this year against anti-Israel and antisemitic hate-writers...