Red Alerts - Missile, Rocket, Drone (UAV - unmanned aerial vehicles), and Terror Attacks and Death Announcements
*7:30pm yesterday - north - rockets Metulla
*10:50pm yesterday - north - rockets - Sha'ar Hayeshuv *12:00pm - north - rockets - Safed, Machenaim, Ramat Dalton, Dalton, Biryia, Mishmar Hayarden, Ayelet Hashahar, Alma - 55 rockets hit the north in retaliation for the 10 people killed in an IDF strike in Lebanon earlier
Fire in the Huleh Valley from the rocket attacks
2 soldiers wounded , 1 seriously and 1 moderately from the rocket attack
Hostage Updates
The US State Department confirms that Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Israel on Sunday “to continue intensive diplomatic efforts to conclude the agreement for a ceasefire and release of hostages and detainees through the bridging proposal presented today by the United States, with support from Egypt and Qatar.”
“This proposal would achieve a ceasefire in Gaza, secure the release of all hostages, ensure humanitarian assistance is distributed throughout Gaza and create the conditions for broader regional stability,” the State Department says.
Blinken “will underscore the critical need for all parties in the region to avoid escalation or any other actions that could undermine the ability to finalize an agreement,” the statement adds.
Channel 12 reports that Israel will send another delegation to Cairo on Sunday to try and close remaining gaps in the hostage talks before another high-level summit will be held in Doha toward the end of next week.
The two biggest obstacles remain the continued presence of Israeli troops along the Philadelphi Corridor between Egypt and Gaza and preventing the transfer of armed Palestinians to the northern Strip.
These were two of the key new demands Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu added last month, insisting that the IDF be allowed to remain in the Philadelphi Corridor and that a mechanism be created to prevent Hamas from reconstituting in northern Gaza.
As for the latter demand, the US has made clear that it will not accept the establishment of a new mechanism amid fears this would take weeks to implement.
On the issue of the Philadelphi Corridor, there are solutions that have been crafted, which the mediators hope will be enough to convince Israel.
At the Rafah Crossing, in particular, the idea is to have a Palestinian force stationed there that is not Hamas, Channel 12 says. Netanyahu has long objected to the Palestinian Authority formally returning to the crossing or other parts of Gaza, but it’s unlikely that an alternative exists.
Where mediators are closer to reaching solutions after the Doha summit are on the number of living hostages who will be released in the first phase of the ceasefire; the names of the Palestinian prisoners Hamas would like to see released, the number of vetoes Israel will have over these names and the number who will be sent to exile outside of the West Bank and Gaza; and the mechanism for implementing the hostage-prisoner exchange.
As far as the US is concerned, the latest proposal being crafted by the mediators will be presented in the form of “take it or leave it,” Channel 12 says, adding that there will be no additional discussions.
Israel will have to decide whether it wants a hostage deal and ceasefire in Gaza or if it will instead face attacks from Iran and Hezbollah, which risk dragging the entire region into a much bigger war, the network says.
Qatar has informed Hamas of all the developments from the past two days of negotiations, but the terror group has yet to publicly say how it plans to proceed. Several officials in the group have issued statements to the press, expressing disapproval of the way the talks went in Doha, but it is still not clear what the official Hamas position is.
In the meantime, the Israeli security establishment believes that progress in the hostage talks puts off attacks from Iran and Hezbollah, but the IDF remains ready for such retaliatory strikes nonetheless,
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office issues a statement expressing appreciation for the efforts of the US and other mediators to try and convince Hamas to accept a hostage deal.
“Israel’s fundamental principles are well known to the mediators and the US, and Israel hopes that their pressure will lead Hamas to accept the May 27 principles, so that the details of the agreement can be implemented,” the PMO’s statement adds, referring to the hostage deal proposal Israel made in late May.
Netanyahu has been roundly accused of adding new demands to that proposal last month, but he has insisted that he merely provided clarifications to help with the implementation of the May proposal.
Relatives of hostages held in Gaza and hundreds of their supporters rallied Thursday to push Israel’s leadership toward an agreement that will free the captives, as a new round of high-stakes talks aimed at reaching a deal kicked off in Qatar with a reportedly “promising start.”
Taking to the streets of Tel Aviv for a procession dubbed the “Last Chance March,” protesters demanded that negotiators dispatched to Doha keep going until a deal is sealed, arguing that time is running out for the more than 100 hostages still held in Gaza since being abducted during the October 7 massacre.
“To the negotiating team — if a deal is not signed today or in the coming days at this summit, do not return to Israel. You have no reason to return to Israel without a deal,” said Yotam Cohen, whose brother Nimrod Cohen is a hostage in Gaza. The march came as the Hamas terror group released an image showing the body of former captive Ofir Tzarfati and saying he had been killed by his guard, underlining what families and experts say are grave threats facing the remaining hostages, several of whom have been confirmed killed. Tzarfati’s body was recovered by IDF troops in late November and brought back to Israel.
“I choose not to look at the image Hamas published,” Tzarfati’s mother Rachel said in a statement released by The Hostage and Missing Families Forum. “What’s important today is for the developing deal to be implemented successfully.” Families have campaigned for months for a deal, exacerbating tensions between them and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whom some accuse of seeking to prolong the war for political gain. In Tel Aviv, Danny Elgarat, whose brother Itzik Elgarat was kidnapped from Nir Oz, said those drawing out the talks unnecessarily would be responsible if his brother dies, pointing a finger at Netanyahu’s far-right coalition allies, who have threatened to bring down the government if a hostage release deal is reached that includes a halt in fighting or troop withdrawal.
“We hear of far-right ministers threatening and sabotaging chances to reach a deal. They prefer territory over lives, and don’t understand that the hostages are a testament to the largest ever security, social, moral and religious failure in Israel’s history,” he said.
Rachel Goldberg-Polin, whose son Hersh is held captive, also lashed out at those blocking a deal.
“Shlomo Mansour, who is 86, doesn’t need to keep paying the price,” she told the Walla news site, referring to the Kissufim octogenarian kidnapped on October 7 and held since. “And if someone feels strongly that an 86-year-old grandfather should continue paying the price, they can put their 86-year-old grandfather in there and bring Shlomo out. It’s time.” Full article
A senior Israeli official tells the Kan public broadcaster that progress was indeed made in Doha on several controversial aspects of the hostage deal being negotiated.
However, the official notes that this progress was only between Israel and the mediators.
It is still unclear how Hamas will respond to these new arrangements.
A lower-level Israeli negotiating team will remain in Doha over the weekend for continued talks with mediators, and a separate lower-level team will travel to Cairo tomorrow for similar meetings. Qatar and Egypt have sometimes divided the negotiations to have the former focus on the hostage aspects and the latter focus on the withdrawal of Israeli troops from key areas in and around Gaza, such as the Netzarim and Philadelphi Corridors along with the Rafah Crossing.
The lower-level delegations will aim to close remaining gaps before the top negotiators reconvene at the end of next week in Cairo to try and finalize a deal.
Risk of regional war hangs over Gaza ceasefire talks
If the leaks to local papers are true, even Israel’s defence chiefs are urging Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to make a deal and agree a ceasefire in Gaza.
Since Israel’s negotiators last made the trip to the Qatari capital for talks, the stakes - and the pressures - have only grown.
In Israel, the relatives of hostages still held in Gaza are calling this the “last chance” to get some of them out alive.
In Gaza, the Hamas-run health ministry - whose figures have been used by the UN and Israel in the past - says the number of people killed in Israeli operations there since the war began has now passed 40,000.
And the US is moving a second aircraft carrier and a missile-equipped submarine to the region, after threats from Iran and its Lebanese ally, Hezbollah, to attack Israel in response to the assassinations of key Hamas and Hezbollah leaders last month.
There is no lack of incentives for a deal.
And no lack of pressure either. The US believes a truce in Gaza could help calm the entire region.
Visiting Lebanon on Wednesday, US envoy Amos Hochstein said a deal would also help create the conditions for a deal in a growing cross-border conflict between Israel and Hezbollah.
“We have to take advantage of this window for diplomatic action and diplomatic solutions,” he said. “That time is now.”
His boss, President Joe Biden, appears to be managing expectations. “It’s getting harder,” he told reporters in New Orleans this week, adding, “I’m not giving up.”
With so much to gain, why are hopes for these talks so thin?
First, the red herring: the declaration by Hamas that it would not send a delegation to the meeting is unlikely to have a major impact.
Negotiations have always been indirect, shuttle diplomacy - Hamas representatives do not talk directly to Israel or the US. And the group’s main international base is Doha, where talks are taking place, and where Qatari and Egyptian negotiators have an open channel of communication with them.
The real issue, according to former Israeli hostage negotiator Gershon Baskin, is a lack of motivation by the Israeli and Hamas leaders.
“The United States, Egypt and Qatar have decided that they need to change the rules of the game: put an ultimatum on the table, put a bridging proposal on the table, and tell Hamas and Israel that they have to do it,” he said.
“[But] it's obviously that the mediators want the agreement more than the parties do, and that's a big part of the problem.”
Chen Avigdori’s wife and 12-year-old daughter were among the 251 people kidnapped by Hamas in the 7 October attacks on Israel, when another 1,200 people were killed. The pair were released in November and he’s now campaigning to get the remaining 111 hostages out.
“I think they are both holding it up,” he said. “I think Sinwar doesn't really care about his own people. But I think that Mr Netanyahu has skipped some opportunities that Israel already had to sign the deal.”
For Yahya Sinwar - one of the masterminds of the 7 October attacks, who became Hamas’s political leader following Ismail Haniyeh’s assassination in Tehran - some analysts believe the calculation may be changing.
“I think Sinwar wants to save himself and save Hamas, because they haven't been destroyed totally, but militarily they've been defeated and it could turn into a rout,” said Chuck Freilich of Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies.
“Netanyahu is in a more difficult position, because if there's a deal, there's a very good chance that he'll lose his coalition.”
Benjamin Netanyahu has so far held fast to certain red lines - including giving Israel the right to restart the war if later talks on troop withdrawal and prisoner exchanges fail.
Mr Netanyahu’s far-right allies have vowed to pull out of the government if, for example, he agrees to release large numbers of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails, in return for the hostages.
The sticking points facing negotiators are substantial. But proposals to bridge some of them have been widely reported in the Israeli media.
For instance, Mr Netanyahu’s insistence that Israeli forces must remain on Gaza’s border with Egypt, to stop armed groups smuggling in weapons, has been countered with solutions involving technology and the involvement of allies on the ground.
Hamas has accused Israel of bringing in new demands and said that the time for negotiation is over. It has said it is ready to implement the terms it agreed to last month. Israel denies it is adding new conditions, describing them as an attempt to clarify what was already agreed.
The deal’s international mediators – the US, Qatar and Egypt – certainly have some leverage over the two sides, but it may not be enough to force an agreement if the parties themselves don’t want one.
“The US and Qatar can push, they can cajole, they can offer inducements, they can offer to help create the technical solutions,” says Chuck Freilich. “But in the end, it's up to the specific leaders.”
Ultimately, the fate of these talks, of Gaza, of the hostages – even the fate of the region itself – will rest on the calculations of two shrewd survivors; two warring men. link
A hostage deal that also averts regional war should be a
no-brainer for Netanyahu. But…
The PM might seize the moment, but he has also been
insisting on ‘total victory’ in the battle against Hamas, and has two coalition
partners that will not settle for anything less
On October 18, 2011, Israel freed 1,027 Palestinian security
prisoners in order to secure the release of Gilad Shalit, an IDF soldier who
had been abducted from his base inside Israel five years earlier and held by
Hamas in Gaza. The prime minister who signed off on this radically lopsided
exchange was of course Benjamin Netanyahu.
In Doha on Friday, American, Egyptian and Qatari mediators
presented a “bridging proposal” for a deal on a permanent ceasefire in Gaza and
the release of all Israeli hostages held by Hamas since its invasion and
slaughter in southern Israel on October 7. They made plain their assessment
that the accord could and should be both finalized and implemented within days.
On the face of it, accepting what is starting to look like
an imminent “take it or leave it” final demand from the mediators is a
no-brainer for Netanyahu.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits troops in Gaza,
December 25, 2023. (Avi Ohayon/GPO)
On October 18, 2011, Israel freed 1,027 Palestinian security
prisoners in order to secure the release of Gilad Shalit, an IDF soldier who
had been abducted from his base inside Israel five years earlier and held by
Hamas in Gaza. The prime minister who signed off on this radically lopsided
exchange was of course Benjamin Netanyahu.
In Doha on Friday, American, Egyptian and Qatari mediators
presented a “bridging proposal” for a deal on a permanent ceasefire in Gaza and
the release of all Israeli hostages held by Hamas since its invasion and
slaughter in southern Israel on October 7. They made plain their assessment
that the accord could and should be both finalized and implemented within days.
On the face of it, accepting what is starting to look like
an imminent “take it or leave it” final demand from the mediators is a
no-brainer for Netanyahu.
From what we are learning of the main ostensible areas of
discrepancy between Israel and the mediators, it is apparent that Netanyahu’s
insistence on some kind of mechanism to prevent the return of armed Hamas
forces to northern Gaza is proving a problem. By contrast, we are given to
understand, potential solutions are being advanced as regards his call for an
ongoing Israeli presence along the Gaza-Egypt border, under and over which
Hamas imported the weapons and materials for its war machine. Not much is being
said about the prime minister’s reported demand for a US guarantee that, in
principle, Israel would be able to resume its campaign against Hamas until the
terror group is destroyed.
Nonetheless, by saying yes to the emerging terms, Netanyahu
would expect to secure the release in the first six weeks of the deal of some
30 living hostages in the so-called humanitarian category — women, the elderly
and the sick. Were the deal to hold up through its second and third envisaged
phases, the rest of the hostages, alive and dead, would come home. A vital,
major step would be taken toward restoring the covenant between Israel’s
political and military leadership on the one hand, and its citizenry on the
other, which was torn asunder when Hamas was able to smash through the fence,
massacre some 1,200 people, mostly Israeli citizens, and abduct over 250 more.
Moreover, it is being widely assessed, a
hostage-for-ceasefire deal in Gaza could yield relative quiet on Israel’s
northern frontier, with Hezbollah holding its fire, and the prospect of a
rebuilding and return for those tens of thousands of Israelis who have been
internally displaced from their homes there for more than 10 months.
This in turn could also relieve the pressure on Israel’s
standing army and its reservists, and enable the beginnings of economic
revival.
The US administration, furthermore, has made plain its
belief that an accord could see Iran delaying or perhaps forgoing its promised
“revenge” against Israel for the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in
Tehran two weeks ago, thus averting inevitable Israeli counterstrikes and a
possible descent into full-fledged war. Hebrew media reports on Friday night
were also asserting an unspoken American threat — that if Netanyahu were to
reject the deal, the US might be rather less supportive of an Israel that found
itself plunged into regional conflict.
The negotiations now coming to a head have been based on a
proposal that Netanyahu and his colleagues approved and conveyed at the end of
May, and relentless reports have indicated that all of Israel’s security chiefs
and negotiators have been imploring him to seize the opportunity for a deal
ever since.
They reportedly assess, among other things, that a six-week
IDF withdrawal from the Philadelphi Corridor along the Gaza-Egypt border is too
short a period to enable a significant rearming of Hamas. They reportedly note
that tackling a resurgent Hamas in northern Gaza one more time would be far
less dangerous and protracted than the initial high-intensity conflict in the
area. And they reportedly argue that while Israel may have to continue fighting
Hamas for a long, long time if it endlessly regenerates itself, there is no
more time for the hostages — many of whom have died in captivity.
Set against all this, the prime minister continues to insist
that the war will not end until all its aims are achieved — that is, all
hostages are returned and Hamas is dismantled. Hence his repeated assertions,
in defiance of the published text, that Israel’s May 27 proposal does not
provide for a permanent ceasefire, and his insistence on the right, at least in
principle, to resume the battle against Hamas.
And then there is the issue of his coalition. His two
far-right partners, Bezalel Smotrich’s Religious Zionism party and Itamar Ben
Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit, are adamant opponents of what they consider a defeatist
and reckless deal; far from ending the war and withdrawing the troops, they
would have Israel permanently resettle the Gaza Strip. And they have
threatened, not entirely credibly, to bring down the government if Netanyahu
defies them. Moderate opposition parties have promised to sustain Netanyahu in
power through the implementation of a deal, but he knows they will provide no
safety net beyond that.
Among those 1,027 Palestinian security prisoners whose
freedom Netanyahu sanctioned 13 years ago was one Yahya Sinwar, the architect
of the barbaric October 7 assault and the undisputed overall leader of Hamas in
the aftermath of Haniyeh’s departure. Sinwar had been in prison for 22 years,
with no prospect of release, having been sentenced to four life terms for
involvement in the killing of four suspected
Palestinian collaborators with Israel.
It may well be that Netanyahu would have had fewer problems
with a deal were Sinwar, the monster he freed, not still on the run in the Gaza
underworld. Israel has been demanding the right to veto or exile some of the
dozens upon dozens of murderous terrorists Hamas is now seeking to get released
in exchange for hostages in the first stage of the deal precisely because of
its recognition that there are other potential Sinwars among them.
But it could also be that Netanyahu, who knows that much of
the Israeli public is clamoring for this deal — a snap Channel 12 TV poll on
Friday night found 63 percent of Israelis back the agreement coming together in
Doha to 12% opposed, with his own voters backing it 42% to 21% against — will
judge that the time is ripe. That, as his preferred next US president Donald
Trump told him, this is the moment to “get your victory.” That he will regard a
successful deal, if not constituting his oft-promised “total victory,” at least
as vindication of 10 months’ military pressure, proof of his commitment to the
hostages, an opportunity to salvage his legacy after the October 7 catastrophe,
and a potential election-winner.
Could be. Then, of course, there would remain the not-insignificant
issue of what Hamas intends to say and do. link
Gaza
My brother's latest column in The Times of Israel: The last Israeli-Palestinian war
People of courage on both sides must stand up now and
say: I am sorry, we have crossed moral red lines that should never be crossed
Since October 7, 2023, two peoples in the Middle East have been living in the deepest trauma they have experienced in 76 years. On October 7, more Jews were killed in one place at one time than at any time since the Holocaust. Israeli Jews and Jewish people all around the world are frozen in time, reliving the horrors of the Hamas atrocities every day. These people have not yet moved on to October 8.
The Palestinian people in Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem, along with Palestinians all around the world, are living in trauma that takes them back 76 years to the Nakba, the catastrophe they experienced in 1948 with the birth of Israel and the dispersion of the Palestinian people. Palestinians have been experiencing this trauma every day since October 7, as the war in Gaza continues, tens of thousands of people killed, some two million people homeless. These traumas will not end until the war in Gaza ends, the fighting stops, Israel withdraws from Gaza and all of the Israeli hostages in Gaza – alive and dead are returned home. Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs will most certainly be post-traumatic when this occurs.
When the war is over, there will hopefully be a new temporary Palestinian administration in Gaza that is acceptable to the Palestinian people and to the world. The Palestinians will invite a credible peacekeeping force to Gaza. Eventually, when there is stability, Palestinians will go to the polls and elect a new leadership that has the legitimacy and the ability to govern with a vision and a commitment that this war must be the last Israeli-Palestinian war. When the war is over, hopefully, the people of Israel will also go to the polls and elect a new government that has legitimacy and the commitment and vision for a new beginning which will do everything possible to ensure that this is the last Israeli-Palestinian war.
With the heightened fear, pain, suffering, and trauma, it is hard to imagine Israelis and Palestinians being capable of entering into a new genuine peace process. But there is no other way. Public opinion research is beginning to note that Israelis and Palestinians in growing numbers realize from the suffering that there is no military solution to this conflict. The only way to move forward is through a political, negotiated process. However, the majority of Israelis and Palestinians believe that it is not possible, because there are no trusted people on the other side.
So now, in recognizing that even after the horrible war there will remain seven million Israeli Jews and seven million Palestinian Arabs living on the same land between the River and the Sea, it is time for people of courage on both sides to stand up and say: I am sorry. We have crossed moral red lines that should never be crossed and what was done, was done in my name. I will not allow this to happen again. Believing that there are partners for genuine peace on the other side will begin with voices of remorse and sorrow.
I, Gershon Baskin, as an Israeli Jew, stand up and say: I am sorry. I am sorry for all of the killing and destruction of my Palestinian neighbors. We should never again allow ourselves to dehumanize our neighbors. We must all make sure that this will be the last Israeli-Palestinian war. link About the Author The writer is the Middle East Director of ICO - International Communities Organization - a UK based NGO working in Conflict zones with failed peace processes. Baskin is a political and social entrepreneur who has dedicated his life to peace between Israel and her neighbors. He is also a founding member of “Kol Ezraheiha - Kol Muwanteneiha” (All of the Citizens) political party in Israel.
Col. Avichay Adraee, the IDF’s Arabic-language spokesman, publishes a list of the zones that need to be evacuated alongside the announcement.
Adraee says that the IDF will “forcefully operate” against terror groups in the Beit Hanoun area.
The IDF has carried out numerous small raids in Beit Hanoun since dismantling the local Hamas battalion there during the initial months of the ground offensive.
Not many Palestinian civilians are thought to be in the Beit Hanoun area. In all of northern Gaza, less than 200,000 Palestinians remain, according to recent IDF assessments.
The evacuation order in Beit Hanoun is unrelated to an earlier order given in the Khan Younis and Deir al-Balah area of the southern Gaza Strip.
Earlier this month, the IDF issued a similar evacuation order for Beit Hanoun following rocket fire on southern Israel.
The Israeli military is calling on Palestinians in the Beit Hanoun area of northern Gaza to evacuate and head to “shelters in the center of Gaza City.”
Gaza has recorded its first polio case in 25 years, the Palestinian Authority health ministry says, after UN chief Antonio Guterres called for pauses in the Israel-Hamas war to vaccinate hundreds of thousands of children.
Tests in Jordan confirmed the disease in an unvaccinated 10-month-old from the central Gaza Strip, the health ministry in Ramallah says.
According to the United Nations, Gaza, now in its 11th month of war, has not registered a polio case for 25 years, although type 2 poliovirus was detected in samples collected from the territory’s wastewater in June.
“Doctors suspected the presence of symptoms consistent with polio,” the health ministry says. “After conducting the necessary tests in the Jordanian capital, Amman, the infection was confirmed.”
The case emerged shortly after Guterres called for two seven-day breaks in the Gaza war to vaccinate more than 640,000 children.
Poliovirus, most often spread through sewage and contaminated water, is highly infectious. It can cause deformities and paralysis, and is potentially fatal. It mainly affects children under the age of five.
The UN health and children’s agencies said they had made detailed plans to reach children across the besieged Palestinian territory and could start this month.
But that would require pauses in the 10-month old war between Israel and Hamas, they say.
Northern Israel - Lebanon/Hizbollah/Syria
Israeli fighter jets struck buildings used by Hezbollah in southern Lebanon’s Maroun al-Ras and Ayta ash-Shab a short while ago, the IDF says.
The IDF also says that an interceptor missile was fired at a suspected drone that entered Israeli airspace from Lebanon earlier this evening, setting off sirens in the Galilee Panhandle.
The military does not say if the target was shot down, though no injuries were caused in the incident.
Separately, a rocket fired from Lebanon struck an open area near the border community of Netu’a, also causing no injuries, the IDF says.
At least 10 people were killed and five wounded in an Israeli strike in the southern Lebanon city of Nabatieh early Saturday, according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry. The Israel Defense Forces said it targeted a Hezbollah weapons depot.
The Lebanese ministry said all the dead were Syrian nationals and included a woman and her two children. Five others were wounded, of whom two were in critical condition.
The strike on Wadi al-Kfour in Nabatieh province was among the deadliest in Lebanon since the Hezbollah terror group started launching attacks on October 8, a day after Hamas attacked southern Israel, sparking Israeli responses.
Mohammad Shoaib, who runs a slaughterhouse in Wadi al-Kfour said the area struck was an “industrial and civilian area,” that contained factories producing bricks, metal, and aluminum, as well as a dairy farm.
Hezbollah has not immediately commented on the strikes.
The IDF confirmed carrying out the airstrike near Nabatieh overnight, saying it targeted a Hezbollah weapons depot.
Additionally, the IDF says fighter jets struck buildings used by Hezbollah in Hanine and Maroun al-Ras, also in southern Lebanon.
West Bank and Jerusalem and Terror attacks within Israel
An initial probe into Thursday night’s settler rampage of the Palestinian village of Jit reportedly reveals that a unit of IDF reservists arrived at the scene shortly after the attack began but did not stop any of the perpetrators.
A senior security official tells Haaretz that “the soldiers did nothing to prevent the pogrom” even though they witnessed it unfold in real time. “They just stood by them, saw everything but did nothing.”
The soldiers were from a Home Front Command unit stationed nearby. The probe reveals that they were joined by a civilian security squad from the illegal outpost of Havat Gilad.
The security source says the IDF and Shin Bet did not have prior knowledge of the attack.
Bullet shells were found at Jit, but the forces claimed they only fired in the air. A 23-year-old Palestinian man was killed, raising questions about the accounts of the Israeli forces at the scene.
The security source adds that despite claims from settlers that Palestinians from the area had been hurling stones at Israeli cars prior to the rampage, there were no verified reports of such incidents.
Politics and the War (general news)
Wheels of justice grind slowly for Oct. 7 terrorists, with prosecution a complex affair Various proposals have emerged for how to tackle the incendiary cases involving many hundreds of suspects, but there’s still no clear decision on how to move forward
More than 10 months have gone by since the cataclysmic October 7 invasion and atrocities committed by Hamas, without any indictments having been filed against the hundreds of terrorists captured by Israeli forces on that day, and in the subsequent ongoing war.
With the State Attorney’s Office remaining tight-lipped on the issue, some politicians have sought to move the process forward.
MK Oded Forer of the Yisrael Beytenu opposition party recently introduced a bill to the Knesset which would establish a special legal mechanism to try Palestinian terrorists who participated in the atrocities and sentence them to death.
Some experts doubt the wisdom of such a step, however, either arguing that it is not necessary since Israel already has laws on the statute book allowing the death sentence for crimes committed by the October 7 terrorists (though it has never before applied it for such acts), or raising concerns about the criminal trial process itself.
Some 3,000 Palestinian terrorists, mostly from the Hamas terror organization, burst across the Gaza border on October 7, and massacred civilians in numerous small communities in the region as well as at the Nova music festival, while also committing mass rape, torture, and other crimes, and kidnapping 251 hostages who were taken captive to Gaza. Following that assault, hundreds of terrorists were captured by Israeli security services in Israel in the days after the attack and in Gaza during the IDF’s ground operations in the territory.
According to the Hamoked organization, there are currently 1,584 unlawful combatants being held in Israeli detention facilities, a category of prisoner that refers to the terrorist combatants who crossed the border into Israel or who fight in Hamas’s terrorist militia. Forer’s bill would create three broad categories of crimes, including crimes against the Jewish people, crimes against humanity, and war crimes, and further defines those crimes to include many of the atrocities committed on October 7.
Anyone found guilty of these crimes would be subject to the death penalty. “In view of the horrific mass atrocities and crimes against humanity committed by Hamas and their helpers as part of the October 7 massacre… against a helpless and defenseless population including the elderly, women and children, appalling horrors characteristic of the crimes of the Nazis, it is proposed to apply the norms established by human society for Nazi criminals and everyone who was complicit in these crimes against our people and against humanity,” Forer’s bill says in its explanatory notes, in reference to the death penalty.
There are three likely avenues for prosecuting the October 7 terrorists, including a criminal trial in Israel’s civil courts, a trial in the IDF’s military court system where Palestinian terror suspects are often prosecuted, or a special court or tribunal established by new legislation.
Although the State Attorney’s Office refuses to comment on the issue, it seems likely that a decision as to the legal framework that will be chosen is yet to be made.
Yuval Kaplinsky, a former head of the International Law Department at the State Attorney’s Office, said it was common for the State Attorney’s Office to take a long time to make such decisions regarding complex cases, and has predicted that indictments may only come at the end of 2025.
But he also foresees serious problems in the criminal prosecutions of these terrorists, as proposed by Forer and others.
Kaplinsky argues that a criminal process for the hundreds of terrorists who would be prosecuted could take decades. “When you prosecute under criminal law you get problems. It generates massive amounts of investigative material [for each defendant] and the defendants get numerous rights such as the right to see the material, the right to an attorney, and others,” Kaplinsky told The Times of Israel.
“Given these rights, and when there are so many potential indictees, the ability of defense attorneys to delay proceedings is practically infinite.”
Kaplinsky pointed by way of example to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s criminal trial, which has lasted for over four years so far, with the defense yet to begin its case. He predicted that criminal trials for the hundreds of October 7 terrorists could take as long as 20 years.
Even in a military trial, the defendants would enjoy many of the same privileges afforded them in the civilian criminal process, and the death penalty would glorify the terrorists, Kaplinsky asserted. Instead, he proposed applying an administrative process for these terrorists, by amending Israel’s Law for Unlawful Combatants, to allow long-term detention without trial, renewable every few years.
This would create a situation akin to the manner in which the US has held terrorists responsible for the September 11 attacks and other terror attacks in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp.
At a conference of the Israel Law and Liberty Forum in March, conservative legal scholar Dr. Rafael Biton took issue with the notion of not prosecuting the October 7 terrorists in a criminal process.
Biton contended that a criminal process would help create “a historic narrative” for the October 7 invasion and atrocities, noting the strong impact the Nuremberg trials and the trial of Adolf Eichman in Israel had on the narrative of the Holocaust.
“This is an historic event. Our legal behavior must be in keeping with this historic vision,” said Biton. He was, however, against criminal prosecution on an individual basis for every defendant, arguing that the October 7 attack was a “collective invasion” and therefore a “collective crime.”
Instead, Biton said that a special law should be passed to try October 7 terrorist suspects on a collective basis, with a presumption that if they were caught by Israel’s security forces in Israel on or after October 7, they took part in the attacks, unless there is compelling evidence to the contrary.
Treating the perpetrators in this way would remove many of the obstacles mentioned by Kaplinsky, including prosecuting each defendant on an individual basis and connecting his actions to a specific victim, with all the investigative work that that requires.
“This was a collective invasion to carry out genocide, crimes against humanity, and crimes against Israeli sovereignty, this was not a group of individuals, they didn’t gather together accidentally,” said Biton.
This crime, he noted, can carry a death sentence in Israel, which he said should be imposed. Link
The Region and the World
A senior Biden administration official briefing reporters says the US has moved a significant amount of military resources in a very coordinated fashion with partners and allies, including the French, the Brits and others, to ensure that “we have everything in place for every possible contingency.”
“We are going to do everything that is needed to defend Israel against any attacks from Iran,” the senior US official says.
“We have also been engaged in extensive diplomacy in the region to make clear the consequences should such an attack occur.”
“Iran claims to those that they’re speaking with… that they want to see a ceasefire [in] Gaza… Now it’s an opportunity to put their money where their mouth is,” the senior US official adds.
He says it would be “ironic” if Iran goes on to derail the ceasefire effort after its proxy Hamas started the war on October 7.
Personal Stories
Oct. 7 victim's mother says she cannot grieve daughter's death while husband is still a hostage
October 7 survivor Gali Idan spoke with CNN broadcaster Wolf Blitzer nearly a year after her 18-year-old daughter Maayan was murdered by Hamas and her husband, Tsachi Idan, was taken hostage.
“In my worst nightmares, I wouldn’t believe that we are meeting in this situation where nothing changed,” Gali said. “It’s been 313 days of hell.”
Blitzer first interviewed Gali in November 2023, just a month after the Idan family was attacked by Hamas in their home in Kibbutz Nahal Oz on the morning of October 7.
Hamas militants killed Maayan as she tried to help her father hold the door of the bomb shelter shut, then held the rest of the family, including two young children, at gunpoint on their kitchen floor for hours. Maayan’s lifeless body was just several metres away. All the while, the terrorists livestreamed the Idan family’s ordeal on Facebook from Gali’s phone until Tsachi, 50, was kidnapped and taken to Gaza.
SIGNS CALL for the release of hostages Tsachi Idan (credit: Hostages and Missing Families Forum)
“I cannot grieve about Maayan yet because I’m in an ongoing war to save my husband,” Gali told Blitzer in a televised interview on Thursday. “I didn’t [go] to see her grave. I couldn’t, and it’s going to be a year, and I need to go and see her, and I can’t – I need Tsachi to be here and we need to do it together.”
Gali said the latest she has heard of her husband’s condition was at the end of November, during the last release of hostages from Gaza: “I had an eyewitness say that she was with him for a day or two and she talked to him, and he was really emotionally down, thinking about Maayan and what happened.”
Gali said it was “unimaginable” that the hostages have not all been returned to Israel.
“It’s been unbearable. We have no air anymore. They have to come back.”
When Blitzer asked if she had any hope that the negotiations taking place between Israel and Hamas will result in a ceasefire deal which will include the release of her husband, Gali said: “Most definitely. Yes. The only way Tsachi and the other hostages can come back is a deal.”
In terms of the looming threat of an Iranian attack and a potential regional war with Lebanon and Iranian proxies, Gali said she was trying to filter the outside information and “keep my eye on the hostages and on Tsachi, my husband, my loved one, my better half.”
“I miss his voice, I miss his hugs, and I miss the time that we have together,” Gali said. “I miss him joking with the kids and laughing, and making dinner with him, and watching a movie, and taking a walk. I miss every little thing.”
Gali said that her other children – Shachar, 10, Yael, 12, and Sharon, 16 “are all talking about Mayaan all the time.”
“A few days ago Sharon came to my room crying in the middle of the night and said, ‘I want my daddy. I want dad here and I miss Maayan.’”
“What can I say to her?” Gali said. “What answer is there? I can’t bring her her dad. I wish I could.” link
Acronyms and Glossary
COGAT - Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories
ICC - International Criminal Court in the Hague
IJC - International Court of Justice in the Hague
MDA - Magen David Adom - Israel Ambulance Corp
PA - Palestinian Authority - President Mahmud Abbas, aka Abu Mazen
PMO- Prime Minister's Office
UAV - Unmanned Aerial vehicle, Drone. Could be used for surveillance and reconnaissance, or be weaponized with missiles or contain explosives for 'suicide' explosion mission
Join my Whatsapp update group https://chat.whatsapp.com/IQ3OtwE6ydxBeBAxWNziB0 Twitter - @LonnyB58
We are continuously learning of more and more of the information that the powers that be had prior to October 7 and did little to nothing. So much is still not known. Most will come out in the Official Committee of Inquiry after the war, but some of that information will not be made public due to security concerns. Following is the information that is public knowledge as of today and is documented. It is presented relatively chronologically but some aspects ran in parallel throughout same and different periods of time. 1. Six years ago, Hamas launched its own television station: Al-Aqsa TV. The station quickly became a highly-effective propaganda tool, which Hamas continues to use to preach its message of hatred of the West, Jews, and Israel. “A fictional series on Palestinian TV last year seemingly predicted key elements of Hamas’ Oct. 7 sneak assault on Israel — from the terrorists’ white vans to targeted kibbutzim and the abduction of Israeli soldiers.” 1 There were so
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