Israel News Today

With US supplies limited, embargoes imposed and competition from Ukraine, IDF turns to third-world deals, shady brokers and billions in spending to maintain its firepower as Israel races to replenish depleted weapons stockpiles after over a year of war from ynet - News https://ift.tt/mnjM12G

Staff Sgt. Zamir Burke, 20, combat engineer squad commander in 401st Brigade's 601st Engineering Battalion, from Beit Shemesh, fell in Jabaliya; IDF aircraft destroy central Gaza rocket launch site poised to fire at Israeli territory from ynet - News https://ift.tt/mTcLvBa

Russian and Syrian forces continue to launch airstrikes to repel rebel advances, as death toll rises to 327; Syrian regime says preparing counteroffensive; army forces reportedly withdraw from Hama, military source denies from ynet - News https://ift.tt/hR7rbFj

Karim Khan submitted a document to the ICC Appeals Chamber, recommending the rejection of Israel's request regarding the Netanyahu and Gallant, stating that 'the decision is procedural and does not directly concern the court's jurisdiction' from ynet - News https://ift.tt/YhQRary

Evacuated residents return on February 1 with grants based on family size; the government will also assist in rebuilding and revitalizing affected communities, and the state will finance housing for displaced residents until reconstruction are complete from ynet - News https://ift.tt/tpISDkJ

Naim Qassem, the successor of Hassan Nasrallah, spoke for the first time since the ceasefire saying 'The agreement is under Lebanese sovereignty, and we defeated the enemy because it was forced to justify it'; Qassem claimed a historic victory as 'One of the signs of the enemy's defeat is that our people are returning to their homes, while its settlers are not' from ynet - News https://ift.tt/JW3unvQ

Amir Avivi: 'From now onwards, Hezbollah must never again be able to rebuild itself' from ynet - News https://ift.tt/frgKAQN

Ohad Munder and his mother Keren recount their first steps back home after their family was abducted to Gaza on October 7 and released in the first hostage deal from ynet - News https://ift.tt/7SrExeQ

Yitzhak Goldknopf criticizes court for targeting Israeli leaders while failing to prioritize release of 101 hostages held by Hamas; FM Sa’ar says Israel has no plans to govern civilian life in Gaza from ynet - News https://ift.tt/yaGW69L

White House envoy addresses representatives of Jewish American communities, detailing Lebanon cease-fire agreement, Biden’s unwavering support for Israel and plans to enforce deal from ynet - News https://ift.tt/Q09KTkz

New cease-fire with Lebanon broadens restrictions on Hezbollah fighters, differing from 2006’s Resolution 1701; IDF ready to enforce deal and warns of possible escalations; US mediator Hochstein details his messages to both sides from ynet - News https://ift.tt/1gkJRPO

Following ICC decision to issue arrest warrant for PM, UK courts would look at 'various issues including immunity' if he traveled there from ynet - News https://ift.tt/KObnkv3

( JTA ) — Jewish parents in Maryland’s Montgomery County have no clue how their school district’s antisemitism investigation is proceeding. It’s been more than nine months since the U.S. Department of Education opened its Title VI civil rights probe into reports of antisemitic bullying, including at pro-Palestinian student protests, at the suburban Maryland district. The case was one of more than 100 investigations the department’s Office of Civil Rights has opened at colleges and K-12 districts since the Gaza war began , part of the Biden administration’s highly publicized efforts to combat rising campus antisemitism and Islamophobia. Yet today, according to department records, the vast majority of those cases have yet to be resolved — including Montgomery County Public Schools’. And the parent activists who initially sounded the alarm on the district say they haven’t heard anything. “If there is an investigation, it certainly doesn’t seem to be causing much concern,” Margery Smel...

Rocket and drone warning sirens sound throughout northern Israel for nearly an hour as cease-fire looms; opponents call on cabinet to not agree to a deal with Lebanon that does not include taking territory on border that would remain under IDF control;  'Any deal that would bring Hezbollah terrorists back to the border near our homes would be criminal negligence'  from ynet - News https://ift.tt/1ucTrPI

Although I’ve lived in Vermont for most of my life, I’m actually a Jewish boy from the Bronx. My parents were refugees from Poland, who escaped the Holocaust when the war began. They embraced this country and its ideals with passion, yet understood how often it did not live up to those ideals. At home, my parents spoke Yiddish to my big sister and me. They knew that we would learn English soon enough, which we of course did. So Yiddish was my first language, my mameh loshn (mother tongue) which has never left me. I came to Vermont in the winter of 1970 to finish my college education that had been interrupted in 1968 due to my activism in the anti-war movement. In my first few years in the Green Mountain State I attended Goddard College in Plainfield and staged plays with the Bread and Puppet Theater. During my first years in Plainfield, I was surrounded by the blossoming counterculture of that time. Bit by bit, I began to learn more about Vermont and Vermonters, its history, what p...

I love the Bible. That’s why I’ve chosen to devote my career to reading and dissecting it, finding new ways to parse its texts and meanings, and teaching about it to classrooms full of undergraduates at a state university in Texas. I believe that learning about the content of the Bible is important for understanding not only religion, but also world history, politics, art and literature. But not like this. The Bluebonnet curriculum about to become part of classroom instruction in some Texas public schools is a travesty. Friday, the Texas State Board of Education voted 8-7 to accept a school curriculum that smuggles Christian religious instruction into public schools. The curriculum is voluntary, but school districts that adopt it will receive financial incentives. The creators of the curriculum have defended its biblical content on the grounds that the Bible is a foundational document of our civilization, so students must understand it to be well-educated citizens. But if an unders...

Abigail Edan, symbol of October 7, celebrates her fifth birthday with her adoptive family after surviving Hamas captivity; her aunt and uncle, who are raising her and her siblings, say, 'She hasn’t changed much, but she’s matured a lot. We’re healing every day' from ynet - News https://ift.tt/rc7uXoH

When Donald Trump campaigned for president in 2016, he vowed to broker the “ultimate deal” to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. That promise remains unfulfilled. Trump’s first term was marked by a series of bold pro-Israel moves, including relocating the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem and recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. His ambitious 2020 peace plan, however, stalled amid Israeli political deadlock, rejection by Palestinian leaders and a pivot toward securing normalization agreements with Gulf states. During the presidential election this year, Trump renewed his pledge to deliver peace in the Middle East, vowing to end the ongoing wars in Gaza and Lebanon while further isolating Iran. His policies for a second term remain vague and his formation of a staunchly pro-Israel cabinet suggests continuity. Rep. Mike Waltz, Trump’s incoming national security adviser, said in an interview with Fox News on Sunday that “now is a moment to craft some type of arrang...

Emirati Interior Ministry announces 'record-time' arrests in murder of Rabbi Zvi Kogan, as Iran increases efforts to harm Israeli officials from ynet - News https://ift.tt/FUtLNWE

Days after Rabbi Zvi Kogan vanished, UAE acknowledges case but referrs to him as 'Moldovan national'; suspicions point to Iranian-backed Uzbek terror cell accused of killing Kogan and fleeing to Turkey from ynet - News https://ift.tt/TJNE6P7

In defense of embattled spokesman, PM lashes out at allegations of leaking classified information, calling investigation politically motivated and likening it to Israel’s broader battles on multiple fronts from ynet - News https://ift.tt/ROm8jTo

Terror group posts footage claiming to show Israeli hostage killed in captivity; military says cannot confirm or deny claim at this stage and the public to ‘refrain from spreading rumors’ from ynet - News https://ift.tt/byZWRQo

The jury summons in the mail felt like something out of a Law & Order episode, but reality proved exhausting and mundane; Daniel Edelson joined dozens of impatient candidates called to a courthouse in Lower Manhattan to participate in the US jury system; here's how it unfolded—right up to the anticlimactic ending from ynet - News https://ift.tt/LTFQImA

Ta-Nehisi Coates’ latest book, The Message, seems to have left half the world outraged — and the other half elated . In both cases, it’s because of what he has to say about Israel and Palestine. That’s fair: This topic takes up more than half of the book. The first two chapters, which describe Coates’ journeys to Senegal and South Carolina, include an examination of Coates’ cultural ancestry and his current personal experiences. But he comes to Israel and Palestine as a complete outsider, making the earlier chapters look like warmups to reach his bigger point. That point is Coates’ advocacy for what might be called morality journalism — at least as much it’s an obvious message about the immorality of Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. When he immerses himself in the region, Coates laments that even journalists he admires convey that “comprehension of ‘conflict’ was a matter of knowledge, not morality.” Toward the end of his Israel-Palestine journey (and the book), he concludes tha...

Over the last 13 months, Noa Fay has met  Matisyahu , Valerie Jarrett,  Tiffany Haddish , the entertainment mogul  Scooter Braun  and the marketing guru Scott Galloway. She’s chatted on the phone with second gentleman  Doug Emhoff , attended a dinner in the White House Rose Garden, spoken at the  United Nations  and a  Senate hearing . She’s appeared on  Fox News  and  CNN , won awards from the  Anti-Defamation League  and the  American Jewish Committee , been  featured in a documentary  and recruited by the United Talent Agency. Noa Fay is 23 years old. Her whirlwind celebrity is rooted in her  experience as a Jewish student at Columbia University in the aftermath of Oct. 7 . A few weeks after the attack, she  spoke out at a news conference  in defense of Israel and against the antisemitism she saw on campus. She has not stopped since. “I’ve started keeping a little bit of a list because I’...

Following Israel Katz's decision to cease using administrative detention orders against Jews in the West Bank, Palestinian Authority officials are saying this will lead to increased assaults by wayward settlers on Palestinian civilians; 'Then they will complain about The Hague,' says MK Tibi from ynet - News https://ift.tt/molPvYz

At least 82 Hezbollah terrorists and militia leaders were killed while the Syrian president was hosting them, and the timing at the height of cease-fire negotiations is no coincidence; 'Israeli attacks in Syria have increased significantly, both in frequency and scope' from ynet - News https://ift.tt/zGouiWs

A Bintel Brief , Yiddish for a bundle of letters, has been solving reader dilemmas since 1906. Send yours via email , social media or this form . Dear Bintel, I’m an American Jewish college student currently studying abroad in Europe. I am writing about a particularly problematic classmate. She is not Jewish or Palestinian or Arab, and to my knowledge has no direct ties to Israel-Palestine. Yet in nearly every single class, she takes the opportunity to broadcast her views on the conflict, never once acknowledging her own privilege as a white, European woman, or taking into consideration how her classmates may be impacted by the violence in the Middle East. Outside of class, I’ve heard her use the term “Zionist” as an insult, and she seems to believe that Israel controls Disney+. I am a progressive Zionist who opposes the occupation, and I don’t believe that anti-Zionism, or criticism of the Israeli government — especially when it comes to the treatment of Palestinians — is inhere...

U.S. lawmakers condemn UN Court's decision to issue the warrants saying the current and next administrations won't abide by them; 'Expect a strong response in January,' Trump official says from ynet - News https://ift.tt/ypazMIB

The International Criminal Court has made history by issuing arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant — the first such action, ever, against the heads of a true democracy. And although the warrants have long been anticipated, after being requested by a prosecutor months ago, the charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity sent shockwaves through Israel. They will restrict Netanyahu’s ability to travel, especially in Europe, and also set the ICC on a collision course with President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming administration, in what could prove to be a watershed test of the court’s power. For Israelis, even critics of Netanyahu, the decision is certain to inflame suspicions that the world’s international bodies are irredeemably biased against them. Israel and its defenders have already regularly objected to the United Nations’ human rights watchdog groups’ undeniably obsessive and disproportionate focus on Israel. ...