JEWISH KING JESUS IS COMING AT THE RAPTURE FOR US IN THE CLOUDS-DON'T MISS IT FOR THE WORLD.THE BIBLE TAKEN LITERALLY- WHEN THE PLAIN SENSE MAKES GOOD SENSE-SEEK NO OTHER SENSE-LEST YOU END UP IN NONSENSE.GET SAVED NOW- CALL ON JESUS TODAY.THE ONLY SAVIOR OF THE WHOLE EARTH - NO OTHER.
1 COR 15:23-JESUS THE FIRST FRUITS-CHRISTIANS RAPTURED TO JESUS-FIRST FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT-23 But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming.ROMANS 8:23 And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.(THE PRE-TRIB RAPTURE)
THE WORST HATE COMES FROM THE LEFTY LEFT.
INVENTION OF THE ATOMIC BOMB.
2 PETER 3:10-11
10
But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which
the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements
(NUKES) shall melt with fervent heat,(BLAST) the earth also and the
works that are therein shall be burned up.(BUT ITS NO END OF THE WORLD
HOGWASH)
11 Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved,(BY
NUKES INCLUDING 3 BILLION PEOPLE) what manner of persons ought ye to be
in all holy conversation and godliness,
NUCLEAR WEAPONS WILL BE USED.
JESUS
SHED HIS BLOOD FOR US THAT WE CAN BE SAVED FOREVER.AND DURING WW3
PEOPLES BLOOD WILL BE SHED AS A JUDGEMENT FOR HATING HIM AND ISRAEL.GOD
IS NOT MOCKED.
ZEPHANIAH 1:2-3
2 I will utterly consume all things from off the land, saith the LORD.
3
I will consume man and beast; I will consume the fowls of the heaven,
and the fishes of the sea, and the stumblingblocks with the wicked; and I
will cut off man from off the land, saith the LORD.
PSALMS 97:3
3 A fire goeth before him, and burneth up his enemies round about.
EZEKIEL 5:15-17
15
So it shall be a reproach and a taunt, an instruction and an
astonishment unto the (ARAB/MUSLIM) nations that are round about
thee,(ISRAEL) when I shall execute judgments in thee in anger and in
fury and in furious rebukes. I the LORD have spoken it.
16 When I
shall send upon them the evil arrows of famine, which shall be for their
destruction, and which I will send to destroy you: and I will increase
the famine upon you, and will break your staff of bread:
17 So will I
send upon you famine and evil beasts,(WHEN RUSSIA/MUSLIMS GET DEFEATED
THIER BODIES GET EATEN BY BIRDS,ANIMALS IN ISRAEL MIGRATION SEASON) and
they shall bereave thee; and pestilence and blood shall pass through
thee;(NUKES) and I will bring the sword upon thee. I the LORD have
spoken it.
REVELATION 14:18-20
18 And another angel came out
from the altar, which had power over fire; and cried with a loud cry to
him that had the sharp sickle, saying, Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and
gather the clusters of the vine of the earth; for her grapes are fully
ripe.
19 And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and
gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of
the wrath of God.
20 And the winepress was trodden without the
city,(JERUSALEM) and blood came out of the winepress, even unto the
horse bridles, by the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs.(200
MILES) (THE SIZE OF ISRAEL)
ISAIAH 66:15-18
15 For, behold,
the LORD will come with fire,(NUKES) and with his chariots like a
whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of
fire.
16 For by fire and by his sword will the LORD plead with all flesh: and the slain of the LORD shall be many.
17
They that sanctify themselves, and purify themselves in the gardens
behind one tree in the midst, eating swine's flesh, and the abomination,
and the mouse, shall be consumed together, saith the LORD.
18 For I
know their works and their thoughts: it shall come, that I will gather
all nations and tongues; and they shall come, and see my glory.
ISAIAH 26:21
21
For, behold, the LORD cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants
of the earth for their iniquity:(GOD/ISRAEL HATE AND BRAKING OF HIS
COMMANDMENTS) the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more
cover her slain.(WW3,1/2 earths population die - 3 BILLION).
ISAIAH 13:6-13 KJV
6 Howl ye; for the day of the LORD is at hand; it shall come as a destruction from the Almighty.
7 Therefore shall all hands be faint, and every man's heart shall melt:(FROM FRIGHT)
8
And they shall be afraid: pangs and sorrows shall take hold of them;
they shall be in pain as a woman that travaileth: they shall be amazed
one at another; their faces shall be as flames.
9 Behold, the day of
the LORD cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land
desolate: and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it.
10 For
the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their
light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall
not cause her light to shine.
11 And I will punish the world for
their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the
arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the
terrible.
12 I will make a man more precious than fine gold; even a man than the golden wedge of Ophir.
13
Therefore I will shake the heavens, and the earth shall remove out of
her place, in the wrath of the LORD of hosts, and in the day of his
fierce anger.
ISAIAH 24:17-23 KJV
17 Fear, and the pit, and the snare, are upon thee, O inhabitant of the earth.
18
And it shall come to pass, that he who fleeth from the noise of the
fear shall fall into the pit; and he that cometh up out of the midst of
the pit shall be taken in the snare: for the windows from on high are
open, and the foundations of the earth do shake.
19 The earth is utterly broken down, the earth is clean dissolved, the earth is moved exceedingly.
20
The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed
like a cottage; and the transgression thereof shall be heavy upon it;
and it shall fall, and not rise again.
21 And it shall come to pass
in that day, that the LORD shall punish the host of the high ones that
are on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth.
22 And they
shall be gathered together, as prisoners are gathered in the pit, and
shall be shut up in the prison, and after many days shall they be
visited.
23 Then the moon shall be confounded, and the sun ashamed,
when the LORD of hosts shall reign in mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and
before his ancients gloriously.
2 TIMOTHY 3:1
1 This know also, that in the last days perilous (DANGEROUS) times shall come.
JOEL 2:3,30
ZECHARIAH 14:12-13
12
And this shall be the plague wherewith the LORD will smite all the
people that have fought against Jerusalem; Their flesh shall consume
away while they stand upon their feet,(DISOLVED FROM ATOMIC BOMB) and
their eyes shall consume away in their holes,(DISOLVED FROM ATOMIC BOMB)
and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth.(DISOLVED FROM
ATOMIC BOMB)(BECAUSE NUKES HAVE BEEN USED ON ISRAELS ENEMIES)(GOD
PROTECTS ISRAEL AND ALWAYS WILL)
13 And it shall come to pass in that
day, that a great tumult from the LORD shall be among them; and they
shall lay hold every one on the hand of his neighbour, and his hand
shall rise up against the hand of his neighbour.(1/2-3 BILLION DIE IN
WW3)(THIS IS AN ATOMIC BOMB EFFECT)
EZEKIEL 20:47
47 And say
to the forest of the south, Hear the word of the LORD; Thus saith the
Lord GOD; Behold, I will kindle a fire in thee, and it shall devour
every green tree in thee, and every dry tree: the flaming flame shall
not be quenched, and all faces from the south to the north shall be
burned therein.
ZEPHANIAH 1:18
18 Neither their silver nor
their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the LORD'S wrath;
but the whole land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy: for
he shall make even a speedy riddance of all them that dwell in the land.
MALACHI 4:1
1
For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven;(FROM ATOMIC
BOMBS) and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be
stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the LORD of
hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.
REVELATION 8:7
7
The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with
blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees
was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up.
REVELATION 9:18
18
By these three was the third part of men killed,(2 BILLION) by the
fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their
mouths.(ATOMIC BOMBS)(RUSSIA CHINA DESTROYED BY ISRAELS ATOMIC BOMBS)
REVELATION 16:12-16
12
And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river
Euphrates;(WERE WW3 STARTS IN IRAQ OR SYRIA OR TURKEY) and the water
thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be
prepared.
13 And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of
the mouth of the dragon,(SATAN) and out of the mouth of the beast,(WORLD
DICTATOR) and out of the mouth of the false prophet.(FALSE POPE)
14
For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth
unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to
the battle of that great day of God Almighty.(WERE 2 BILLION DIE FROM
NUKE WAR)
15 Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.
16 And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.
17
And the seventh angel poured out his vial into the air; and there came a
great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, It is
done.
JOEL 3:2 (YOU WANNA DIVIDE JERUSALEM IN HALF (HALF OF EARTHS POPULATION KILLED AS A RESULT)
02-I
will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley
of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people and for my
heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted
my land.
PROOF HALF ON EARTH DIE DURING THE 7 YR TRIBULATION PERIOD (8 BILLION ON EARTH)
REVELATION 6:7-8 (8 BILLION- 2 BILLION = 6 BILLION)
7 And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see.
8
And I looked, and behold a pale horse:(CHLORES GREEN) and his name that
sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given
unto them over the fourth part of the earth,(2 BILLION) to kill with
sword,(WEAPONS) and with hunger,(FAMINE) and with death,(INCURABLE
DISEASES) and with the beasts of the earth.(ANIMAL TO HUMAN DISEASE).
REVELATION 9:15,18 (6 BILLION - 2 BILLION = 4 BILLION)
15 And the four(DEMONIC WAR) angels were loosed,
18
By these three was the third part of men killed,(2 BILLION) by the
fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their
mouths.(NUCLEAR ATOMIC BOMBS)
HALF OF EARTHS POPULATION DIE DURING THE 7 YR TRIBULATION.(THESE VERSES ARE JUDGEMENT SCRIPTURES NOT RAPTURE SCRIPTURES)
LUKE
17:34-37 (8 TOTAL BILLION - 4 BILLION DEAD IN TRIB = 4 BILLION TO JESUS
KINGDOM) (HALF DIE DURING THE 7 YR TRIBULATION PERIOD JUST LIKE THE
BIBLE SAYS)(GOD DOES NOT LIE)(AND NOTICE MOST DIE IN WAR AND
DISEASES-NOT COMETS-ASTEROIDS-QUAKES OR TSUNAMIS)
34 I tell you, in
that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken,(IN
WW3 JUDGEMENT) and the other shall be left.(half earths population 4
billion die in the 7 yr trib)
35 Two women shall be grinding together; the one shall be taken,(IN WW3 JUDGEMENT) and the other left.
36 Two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken,(IN WW3 JUDGEMENT) and the other left.
37
And they answered and said unto him, Where, Lord? And he said unto
them, Wheresoever the body is, thither will the eagles be gathered
together.(Christians have new bodies,this is the people against
Jerusalem during the 7 yr treaty)(Christians bodies are not being eaten
by the birds).THESE ARE JUDGEMENT SCRIPTURES-NOT RAPTURE
SCRIPTURES.BECAUSE NOT HALF OF PEOPLE ON EARTH ARE CHRISTIANS.AND THE
CONTEXT IN LUKE 17 IS THE 7 YEAR TRIBULATION OR 7 YR TREATY PERIOD.WHICH
IS JUDGEMENT ON THE EARTH.NOT 50% RAPTURED TO HEAVEN.
MATTHEW 24:37-42 (THESE ARE JUDGEMENT SCRIPTURES-SURE NOT RAPTURE SCRIPTURES)
37 But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.
38
For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and
drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe
entered into the ark,
39 And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.
40 Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken,(IN WW3 JUDGEMENT) and the other left.
41 Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken,(IN WW3 JUDGEMENT) and the other left.
42 Watch therefore:(FOR THE LAST DAYS SIGNS HAPPENING) for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come.
NAHUM 3:13
13
Behold, your troops are women in your midst. The gates of your land are
wide open to your enemies; fire has devoured your bars.
DR DOCTORION-ANGEL OF THE MIDEAST
"The
angel showed me that the United Nations shall be broken in pieces
because of the crisis in the Middle East. There shall be no more United
Nations. The angel with the sickle shall reap the harvest.
FIRST ANGEL: ASIA
But
the angel said: "Millions will die in China and in India. Nation will
be against nation, brother against brother. Asians will fight each
other. Nuclear weapons shall be used, killing millions."Twice I heard
the words, "Catastrophic! Catastrophic!"Then the angel said, "Financial
crisis will come to Asia. I will shake the world."I was trembling while
the angel was speaking.
SECOND ANGEL: MIDDLE EAST
Then I saw that
the second angel had a sickle in his hand, such as is used in
harvesting.The second angel said: "Harvest time has come in Israel and
the countries all the way to Iran."I saw those countries in a few split
seconds."All of Turkey and those [inaudible] countries that have refused
me and refused my message of love shall hate each other and kill one
another."I saw the angel raise the sickle and come down on all the
Middle East countries. I saw Iran, Persia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, all of
Georgia - Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, all of Asia Minor - full
of blood. I saw blood all over these countries. And I saw fire; Nuclear
weapons used in many of those countries. Smoke rising from everywhere.
Sudden destruction – men destroying one another. I heard these
words:"Israel, Oh Israel, the great judgment has come."
Support
for Israel strongest in Kenya and Nigeria, survey of 24 countries
finds-Pew Research Center shows that some areas have seen a significant
swing against Israel in recent years, Netanyahu’s favorability is low
across the board-By Luke Tress Today, 10:50 pm-JUN 5,25
International
views of Israel and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are largely
negative, especially on the political left and with the young, according
to a survey released on Tuesday.The Pew Research Center surveyed adults
in 24 countries about their views of Israel and Netanyahu, and reported
on how those views have changed over time.In 20 of the countries, at
least half of the respondents had a negative view of Israel, led by
Turkey, with 93%, followed by Indonesia, 80%, Japan, 79%, the
Netherlands, 78%, and Spain and Sweden, both at 75%.The outliers were
Kenya and Nigeria. In Kenya, 50% had a favorable view of Israel and 42%
unfavorable, and in Nigeria, 59% were favorable and 32% unfavorable.
Those countries, like Israel, have grappled with Islamic terrorism in
recent years. The only other African country surveyed was South Africa,
where 54% had a negative view.In India, views were mixed, with 34% of
respondents reporting a favorable view of Israel and 29% unfavorable.In
the US, 53% of respondents were opposed to Israel and 45% in favor.The
median for all countries surveyed was 62% unfavorable and 29% favorable.
Some respondents did not know or refused to answer.Younger people were
more against Israel, especially in high-income countries such as the US,
Australia, Canada, France and South Korea.Some countries have seen a
significant swing against Israel in recent years. In the US, Israel’s
unfavourability jumped 11 percentage points since the spring of 2022. In
the UK, it went up 17 points since 2013. France, Germany, Italy, Spain,
Indonesia and Turkey also saw an increase in hostility against
Israel.Turkey was the only Middle Eastern country surveyed, besides
Israel. In Israel, 81% of respondents had a favorable view of the
country.Respondents on the political left were more hostile to Israel,
particularly in Europe and Australia. In Spain, 91% of those on the left
had a negative view of Israel, in Australia and the Netherlands it was
90%, and in Greece, 89%.In the US, 74% of those on the left had an
unfavorable view of Israel, compared to 30% on the right.The results are
in line with other surveys that have found that young and left-leaning
Americans are increasingly hostile to Israel.Netanyahu’s approval
ratings were low across the board, except for in Kenya and Nigeria. The
countries most against the prime minister were Turkey, Spain, Italy,
Sweden, the Netherlands and France.The survey also asked Israelis about
how they think Israel is viewed around the world. The majority — 58% —
said Israel is not respected globally. Israelis on the right were more
likely to say Israel was respected abroad. Israeli Arabs and Jews had
roughly the same opinion.The margin of error ranged from 2.5% to 4.7%,
depending on the country. The survey was carried out between January and
April, and polled at least 1,000 residents in each foreign country.
Official:
Shin Bet proposed initiative after PM nixed PA involvement-Arab envoy:
Netanyahu’s arming of Gaza gang shows ‘he’s learned little since Oct.
7’Ambassador laments Israeli PM’s unabated effort to weaken PA, warning
that latest effort to divide Palestinians ‘increases chances of
Somalia-like scenario’ in the Strip-By Jacob Magid-Today, 11:32 pm-JUN
5,25
An Arab ambassador said Thursday that Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to arm one of Gaza’s most notorious
criminal gangs as a foil to Hamas demonstrates that “he has learned
little since October 7.”“Netanyahu worked to weaken the [Palestinian
Authority] by bolstering Hamas in Gaza before October 7, and now he is
doing it by bolstering this gang of criminals,” the ambassador told The
Times of Israel on condition of anonymity, likening the Gaza financial
aid that Netanyahu solicited from Qatar for Hamas to the transfer of
weapons that the premier authorized to the Abu Shabab clan, which is
widely known for its looting of humanitarian aid in Gaza.Netanyahu has
denied bolstering Hamas through the Qatari aid, insisting that it was
meant to stave off a humanitarian crisis in the blockaded Strip.
However, critics have argued that the hundreds of millions of dollars
that came in from Qatar allowed Hamas to focus on expanding its military
arsenal in the years leading up to its October 7, 2023, attack when
some 1,200 people were killed in southern Israel and another 251 were
taken hostage.“Netanyahu didn’t want to work with the PA then because it
would have meant advancing a broader diplomatic resolution to the
conflict, and he is taking the same approach now,” the senior Arab
diplomat said.“Arming clans in Gaza only further divides the
Palestinians and increases the chances of a Somalia-like scenario in
Gaza,” the ambassador said, expressing concern that the Strip will
become a failed state characterized by lawlessness and rival militia
groups.Netanyahu’s decision to arm the Abu Shabab clan was kept secret
from his far-right coalition partners, who would have likely come out
against the move. National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir and Finance
Minister Bezalel Smotrich have long spoken out against Israel’s
decision to arm the PA as part of the Oslo Accords. But Israel’s
security establishment has backed the paradigm, arguing that the PA has
played a critical role in stabilizing the West Bank.In confirming his
decision to arm the Abu Shabab clan earlier today, Netanyahu made a
point of stressing that the initiative was advanced “in consultation
with security officials.”“We made use of clans in Gaza that are opposed
to Hamas… What’s wrong with that?” he asked. “It’s only good. It saves
the lives of IDF soldiers.”But an Israeli official told The Times of
Israel that such schemes were only proposed by the Shin Bet because
Netanyahu has barred the security establishment from advancing Gaza
security initiatives that involve the PA.Granting a foothold in Gaza to
the Palestinian Authority — which backs a two-state solution to the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict — would likely have risked collapsing
Netanyahu’s government, given Ben Gvir and Smotrich’s strong disregard
for the PA.Allowing the PA to play a role in Gaza would unlock the
support of roughly half a dozen Arab countries who have expressed
willingness to play a role in the post-war rehabilitation of Gaza if
invited by Ramallah.But that initiative has never gotten off the ground
due to opposition from Netanyahu, who has likened the PA to Hamas, while
rejecting the notion of entrusting Israel’s security to foreign
actors.The Israeli stance is widely understood to be an extension of
Netanyahu’s efforts to thwart a two-state solution, which would be
advanced by having a single governing authority in both Gaza and the
West Bank, where the PA is currently based.
Reporter's notebook-A
city of booby traps, tunnels: ToI in Khan Younis hours after bodies of 2
hostages retrieved-Troops advance slowly in southern Gaza city, day
after bodies of slain hostages Gadi Haggai and Judih Weinstein were
recovered and brought home for burial-By Stav Levaton-Today, 9:09 pm-JUN
5,25
KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip — After recovering the bodies of
slain hostages Gadi Haggai and Judih Weinstein in Khan Younis on
Wednesday night, Israeli forces continued to push deeper into the city
in the southern Gaza Strip, intensifying operations aimed at reaching
its center.Now entering its 20th month, the war has left Khan Younis in
ruins — a shattered landscape almost unrecognizable from what it once
was. The Israel Defense Forces last operated deep in Khan Younis with
ground troops in April 2024.The devastation served as a stark reminder
of the toll exacted by Israel’s offensive in Gaza, launched in response
to Hamas’s brutal October 7, 2023, invasion, during which 1,200 people
were killed and 251 taken hostage.Despite the widespread destruction
already inflicted across the Strip, military officials told reporters
during a Thursday tour of Khan Younis that there is still a long road
ahead to reach full operational success.Commander of the Kfir Brigade’s
Shimshon Battalion, Lt. Col. Yud — identified only by his first Hebrew
initial due to security concerns — reaffirmed the war’s primary goals:
the return of the hostages and the dismantling of Hamas. These
objectives, he said, are what justify the IDF’s continued presence in
Gaza.“That’s all that interests us,” he said.The Kfir Brigade has been
operating in southern Khan Younis for the past three weeks, working in
close coordination with the Israeli Air Force, combat engineers from the
elite Yahalom unit, and other forces. Their mission: to reach the
city’s center and establish operational control.Progress, however, has
been slow and grueling. The city is laced with terror infrastructure,
including a sprawling tunnel network and buildings rigged with
explosives, military officials said. Every step forward requires
methodical clearing, turning each advance into a battle not only against
Hamas gunmen, but against the terrain itself.In one case, military
officials spoke of a residential building flagged by troops as
suspicious in recent days due to a surveillance camera at the entrance, a
bolted door, and telltale signs of guerrilla tactics — including a hole
in the wall designed to allow a gunman to fire from within.Upon
inspection, the structure was found to be booby-trapped and was
subsequently demolished by Israeli forces.Traces of terror activity
remain scattered among the ruins. In the rubble of one demolished home,
several unused rockets lay in a heap — a grim monument to the arsenal
hidden in plain sight and the constant threat posed to Israeli
communities just across the border.Despite the intensity of the
fighting, Yud said morale among his troops remains high.“We can see the
kibbutzim across the border — we know well why we’re here,” he said,
referring to nearby communities like Nir Yitzhak and Sufa, where some
residents have already returned after being evacuated in the wake of
Hamas’s October 7 attack.Also, just across the border lies Nir Oz, the
kibbutz from which Haggai and Weinstein were abducted that fateful
morning.Yud said the recovery of their bodies the night before added
“more drive to keep on fighting,” amid his unit’s third week of
operations in the Strip.The extended deployments in Gaza are not without
strain. Troops typically serve two weeks inside Gaza, followed by four
days out — a rotation that offers brief relief but continues to weigh
heavily on soldiers and their families.In most standing army units,
including the Shimshon Battalion, phones are not allowed inside the
Strip, limiting communication to a single weekly call, typically on
Fridays before Shabbat. To maintain a semblance of connection, certain
commanders run shared WhatsApp groups with families, offering sparse but
critical updates — a digital lifeline for those waiting anxiously for
their loved ones at home.The duration of the IDF’s presence in Gaza
remains uncertain. Last Sunday, the military announced plans to
establish control over 75% of the territory within two months — a move
that signals the intention to maintain a long-term presence aimed at
dismantling Hamas’s capabilities.“I know that there are still hostages, I
know well what [Hamas] did on October 7 — therefore we don’t know how
much longer we’ll stay [in Gaza],” Yud added.
IDF says it hit
Islamic Jihad site near Gaza hospital-GHF resumes Gaza aid distribution
after temporarily closing sites to boost security-New distribution point
opens in Tel Sultan area of Rafah after over 24 hours of closures;
videos, eyewitnesses said to bolster claims IDF behind recent deadly
fire near aid centers By Emanuel Fabian,Lazar Berman,Nurit Yohanan and
ToI Staff Today, 8:40 pm-JUN 5,25
The Gaza Humanitarian
Foundation resumed operations near Rafah’s Tel Sultan neighborhood on
Thursday afternoon, a spokesman for the organization said, after it shut
down aid distribution for over 24 hours to work out security issues,
prompted by three straight days of mass casualty incidents.After
Wednesday’s shutdown stretched unexpectedly into Thursday morning, an
Arabic-language message was published in the early afternoon, informing
Gazans that a new aid distribution site had opened in the Saudi
neighborhood of Tel Sultan.The center is located in one of the large
school complexes in the center of the neighborhood, a GHF spokesperson
told The Times of Israel.The new site is intended to replace another
location in the so-called Swedish Village area on Gaza’s far southern
coast, which was permanently shuttered on Thursday, after just a few
days of operations.Images shared by GHF showed Gazans picking up food
from the Swedish Village distribution site ahead of its closure.The
scenes near the unfinished Kuwaiti hospital along the Egyptian border
showed some disorder as civilians opened boxes and filled bags to carry,
but the area appeared to be relatively uncrowded.A video clip shared by
the group showed a staffer with a camera photographing about a dozen
smiling and waving Gazans.GHF said 18,240 boxes of food were delivered
at the Tel Sultan “Swedish Village” site, and 6,720 were picked up at
the new site in the nearby Saudi neighborhood.The foundation says that
food in all of those boxes amounts to roughly 1.5 million meals. The
products are largely dry foods, though, which require cooking equipment
or community kitchens in order to prepare.The new location in the Tel
Sultan area was opened after a brief shutdown of all GHF aid centers,
implemented to give time for the US and Israel-backed organization to
carry out logistical work needed to accommodate larger crowds.The
closure was also intended to give the IDF time to prepare safer access
routes to the sites, a GHF spokesperson said, following days of
mass-casualty incidents across the various GHF locations.The initial
mass casualty event came on Sunday as hundreds of Gazans made their way
to an Israeli and US-backed aid distribution compound in Rafah — the
only one open that day, amid the partial easing of a more than two-month
blockade on aid into the Strip.Hamas-controlled health authorities in
the war-torn enclave reported that 31 people had been killed and nearly
200 had been wounded in the pre-dawn shooting near the distribution
center in Rafah, for which the IDF largely denied responsibility.The
death toll could not be verified, nor were the subsequent Hamas-issued
tolls of three killed on Monday and 27 killed on Tuesday in similar
incidents.Claims of IDF responsibility for deadly fire-The IDF has
acknowledged firing warning shots at Palestinians headed to the
distribution site before it was open or who approached it from outside
the designated safe route. The military said that its fire hit an
unspecified number of people, but did not acknowledge killing anybody.At
the same time, it said that Hamas’s claims of dozens killed and wounded
were “exaggerated.” In an international press briefing, a government
spokesman claimed that reports of IDF troops firing at civilians near
aid sites were “based on Hamas propaganda.”Eyewitness accounts, video
testimony, and expert analysis cited by separate US and Israeli news
outlets on Thursday bolstered claims that Israeli forces had indeed shot
at Gazan civilians seeking aid near Rafah.According to the analyses
published Thursday, the IDF was potentially firing in an apparent
attempt at crowd control, which experts said was a recipe for disaster
given the masses of people involved. However, some eyewitnesses quoted
in the reports claimed the military was intentionally shooting to kill.A
CNN investigation cited more than a dozen eyewitnesses, including some
who were wounded amid the incident, who said Israeli troops “shot at
crowds in volleys of gunfire that occurred sporadically through the
early hours of Sunday morning.”The report noted that GHF had said
Israeli forces were operating in the same area during the same
period.The shooting took place around half a mile from the aid
distribution site in Rafah’s Tel al-Sultan neighborhood, the report
said. The shooting’s location, where hundreds of Palestinians had
gathered, was confirmed via CNN’s geolocation of videos from the
scene.None of the videos definitively showed who fired the
shots.However, the CNN report cited weapons experts who said the rate of
gunfire, as well as photos of retrieved bullets, were consistent with
tank-mounted machine guns used by the IDF, and inconsistent with weapons
used by Hamas. Multiple people also told CNN they saw gunfire coming
from Israeli tanks in the area.A separate report by Haaretz also cited
eyewitness accounts and video pointing to Israel having carried out the
shooting. The outlet quoted an unnamed military official as saying that
senior officers sought to lay down fire as a way to direct Gazans away
from the military position and toward the aid site.“The intention was to
direct the population via fire,” the officer was quoted as saying. “The
army treated this like a regular situation of suspects entering a
combat zone, but it’s impossible to direct a population at scales this
large with fire if you want them to feel safe getting to areas you have
opened.”The military initially denied any role in Sunday’s shooting,
although military sources were said to have acknowledged it in private.
On Tuesday, however, the IDF confirmed that Israeli troops had indeed
fired shots in the area, and said that they were warning shots intended
for suspects about a kilometer away.The IDF did not respond to the CNN
report on Thursday, nor did it respond to the Haaretz report.Although
the number of dead and wounded in the incident could not be verified,
the International Committee of the Red Cross reported that its field
hospital was overwhelmed on Sunday as a result of the shooting, calling
it the “highest number of weapon-wounded in a single incident” since it
opened the field hospital a year ago.Doctors at nearby Nasser Hospital,
which also absorbed some of the wounded, shared with CNN photos of the
bullets taken from the bodies of patients killed in the incident. They
were consistent with the type of ammunition used by Israeli weapons,
including the FN MAG.Dr. Ahmad Abou-Sweid, an Australian working at
Nasser, told CNN, “There was a heavy proportion of head-targeted
injuries from bullet wounds.”Meanwhile, Gazans who spoke to Haaretz
rejected the claim that there were armed Palestinians in the area who
may have been responsible for the shooting, rather than the IDF.One
local, identified only by the Hebrew initial Aleph, called the claim
“baseless.”“There were no gunmen. There were planes, artillery and
drones. The people who were there were innocent civilians who came to
receive a share of the aid,” Aleph said.“What I saw there is hard to
digest — fire for long minutes, in all directions,” they continued.
“There was a machine gun on a crane and I saw it firing as if it were a
robot, and that’s in addition to the drones.”“The shooting came from all
sides, as though the people who came to the compound were planning an
invasion, and not hungry people who wanted food.”Another eyewitness
dismissed suggestions that the first was a failed attempt at crowd
control, telling CNN that he had witnessed the deliberate targeting of
civilians.“I have seen a lot of soldiers in this war. When they want to
clear an area or warn you, they shoot around you. But yesterday, they
were shooting to kill us,” said Mohammad Abu Rezeq, who was shot in the
stomach.While the IDF has not directly responded to the allegations laid
out by CNN and Haaretz, it appeared to try and rebuff them in an
indirect manner.On Thursday afternoon, the military published an audio
recording that it said was of a conversation between a Gazan man and an
officer from the Defense Ministry’s Coordinator of Government Activities
in the Territories, in which he claimed that Hamas is the one who
opened fire on Palestinians near the Rafah aid distribution site.“The
people who fired were Hamas terrorists,” the Gazan man says, according
to a translation provided by the IDF.“They don’t want the people to
receive aid, they want to foil the plan so that the aid will go to them,
allowing them to steal it. They’ve gone completely bankrupt,” the man
said.Aid delivery difficulties continue-Even with the reopened
distribution centers, problems continued to plague aid delivery efforts
on Thursday, after a labor union representing Gazan truck drivers said
it was going on strike, halting aid deliveries within the Strip.The
Private Transport Association said it was calling the strike in response
to an incident on Wednesday in which a convoy of trucks carrying
humanitarian aid was attacked by gunmen in central Gaza.The union said
gunmen had shot and killed several drivers in the Deir al-Balah area,
and had wounded and abducted several others.Israel has said that
hundreds of trucks packed with food, medicine and other assistance were
awaiting transport from the Kerem Shalom crossing to warehouses run by
the UN and other humanitarian groups throughout Gaza.The union’s ties to
Hamas are also hazy, as before the war, most unions in Gaza were
affiliated with the terror group.Strike targets Gaza City hospital-The
IDF’s military offensive continued across the Gaza Strip on Thursday,
with operations including an airstrike at a hospital in Gaza City.The
military said that the strike at the Al-Ma’amadani Hospital targeted a
Palestinian Islamic Jihad command center in the medical center’s
courtyard.The Hamas-run health ministry claimed, however, that the
strike had hit a press compound and killed three people.Reports named
one victim as Ismail Badr, a cameraman for the Islamic Jihad-affiliated
Palestine Today channel. A second journalist, Suleiman Hajaj, was also
killed, according to reports.The IDF said the compound was being used by
Islamic Jihad operatives to plan and carry out attacks on troops and
Israeli civilians.As always, it said it took steps to minimize civilian
harm, including by using a precision munition, aerial surveillance, and
other intelligence.Elsewhere in the Strip, Nasser Hospital said it had
received the bodies of 10 Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes in Khan
Younis overnight.
PMO says Israel will 'defeat Hamas through
various means'Israel providing guns to Gaza jihadist gang to bolster
opposition to Hamas-Security cabinet wasn’t informed of plan to start
arming the group, which was created in Rafah last year and has its roots
in looting aid trucks-By Emanuel Fabian,Nurit Yohanan,Nava Freiberg and
ToI Staff Today, 5:32 pm-JUN 5,25
Israel has been arming a
criminal gang of jihadists in the Gaza Strip as part of an effort to
strengthen opposition to Hamas in the enclave, defense sources confirmed
on Thursday following remarks on the matter by former defense minister
Avigdor Liberman.Liberman, who heads the opposition Yisrael Beytenu
party, told the Kan public broadcaster on Thursday morning that Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had unilaterally approved the transfer of
weapons to the Abu Shabab clan, an armed gang or militia that is opposed
to Hamas’s rule in the Gaza Strip.“The Israeli government is giving
weapons to a group of criminals and felons, identified with Islamic
State, at the direction of the prime minister,” Liberman charged. “To my
knowledge, this did not go through approval by the cabinet.”He claimed
that Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar was aware of the decision to arm the
group, “but I don’t know how much the IDF chief of staff was in on
it.”The group in question, which is sometimes described as a militia and
sometimes as a criminal gang, is led by Yasser Abu Shabab, a member of a
large clan in southern Gaza.His gang has been documented in recent days
operating in an area near the Kerem Shalom border crossing under
Israeli military control.In the footage, which was published online by
Abu Shabab, members of the group can be seen wearing military-style
uniforms with the Palestinian flag and the words “Counter-Terrorism
Mechanism” emblazoned on them.The Prime Minister’s Office, in response
to Liberman’s comments, did not deny the allegations but said instead
that Israel was “working to defeat Hamas through various means, based on
the recommendations of all the heads of the security
establishment.”Liberman’s accusation was later confirmed by defense
officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity, and the details were
cleared for publication by the Israeli military censor.The sources
confirmed that Israel has been arming the gang with Kalashnikov rifles,
including some that were seized from Hamas during the ongoing war.The
decision to start arming the group was made without the approval of
Israel’s security cabinet, forgoing normal procedure. It was instead led
by Israeli security bodies, with Netanyahu’s approval, the defense
sources said.The militia has been operating in Rafah, in an area under
Israeli military control. Abu Shabab has claimed to be securing the
humanitarian aid convoys entering Israel through the southern border
crossings, although others have accused his gang of looting
them.Targeted by Hamas-The clan has caught Hamas’s attention. On May 30,
Hamas published an official video on May 30 showing a group of armed,
masked men operating outside a building before being blown up.The terror
group claimed the group in the video was working with the IDF to
inspect buildings before Israeli troops moved in, without specifying
whether they were Israeli or Palestinian. However, online comparisons to
previous images of Abu Shabab’s gang suggested it was the same group.In
a conversation with Lebanon’s Al-Akhbar newspaper earlier this week,
anonymous Hamas sources shared more information about the group, which
they admitted has been a thorn in their side.According to the sources,
the militia comprises some 300 people, of whom Abu Shabab personally
recruited around 50. They alleged that the remaining 250 members were
recruited through the Palestinian Authority’s intelligence service.The
Hamas sources did not offer proof of Abu Shabab’s alleged ties to the
Ramallah-based PA, and Al-Akhbar did not verify any of the terror
group’s claims.The group emerged in Rafah in May 2024, following the IDF
invasion of the Strip’s southernmost city, the Hamas sources said. They
told Al-Akhbar that the Al-Qassam Brigades have “already started
carrying out direct assassinations” against members of Abu Shabab’s
gang, and that its continued existence has fast become a “central issue”
for the terror group.According to the sources, some members of the
group belong to an extremist Salafi faction that had run-ins with Hamas
prior to the war as well.This is not the first time that Netanyahu has
been involved in or accused of propping up burgeoning militias and
terror groups to undermine a common enemy.Various reports over the years
have indicated that Israel’s policy under Netanyahu was to treat Hamas
as an asset that could be used to weaken the Palestinian Authority.The
premier reportedly told a Likud faction meeting back in 2019 that anyone
who opposed the establishment of a Palestinian state should support
sending funds to Hamas, the enemy of the internationally recognized
Palestinian Authority.Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich made a similar
claim in an interview in 2015.Amid the outrage generated by Liberman’s
revelation on Thursday, the left-wing The Democrats leader Yair Golan
pointed out the pattern of behavior.“Netanyahu, who transferred billions
to Hamas in suitcases full of cash, based on the incorrect belief that
Hamas is an ‘asset,’ is now promoting a new dangerous concept: Arming a
Gazan militia with ties to ISIS,” the politician wrote on X.“Netanyahu
is dangerous to Israel’s security,” he charged. “This is not a mistake.
This is systematic. Netanyahu is selling Israel’s security for another
day in office.”
Boulder firebomber is Egyptian national, but
Egypt not on list-Trump bans citizens of 12 countries from entering US,
ties move to attack on Colorado rally-US president blacklists
Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti,
Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen; citizens of 7 more nations partially
restricted By Agencies and ToI Staff Today, 12:21 pm-JUN 5,25
US
President Donald Trump signed a proclamation on Wednesday banning the
citizens of 12 countries from entering the United States, saying the
move was needed to protect against “foreign terrorists” and other
security threats, specifically tying the move to the firebomb attack on a
Colorado rally for the hostages held in Gaza despite the attacker not
coming from a listed nation.The directive is part of an immigration
crackdown Trump launched this year at the start of his second term,
which has also included the deportation to El Salvador of hundreds of
Venezuelans suspected of being gang members, as well as efforts to deny
enrollments of some foreign students and deport others.The countries
affected by the latest travel ban are Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, Congo,
Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and
Yemen.The entry of people from seven other countries — Burundi, Cuba,
Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela — will be
partially restricted.“We will not allow people to enter our country who
wish to do us harm,” Trump said in a video posted on X. He said the list
could be revised and new countries could be added.Notably, Syria is not
on the list despite having been named in a previous Trump ban in 2017,
during his first term. The latest decision comes amid a US-Syria
rapprochement, weeks after the US president met Syrian President Ahmad
al-Sharaa in Saudi Arabia, later praising the former jihadist as a
“young, attractive guy. Tough guy. Strong past.”The proclamation is
effective on June 9, 2025, at 12:01 am EDT (0401 GMT). Visas issued
before that date will not be revoked, the order said.Trump said the new
travel ban is tied to an attack on a rally in Colorado, in which a man
tossed Molotov cocktails into a crowd of demonstrators on behalf of
hostages held in Gaza, as an example of why the new restrictions are
needed.“The recent terror attack in Boulder, Colorado, has underscored
the extreme dangers posed to our country by the entry of foreign
nationals who are not properly vetted,” Trump said in a video message.An
Egyptian national, Mohamed Sabry Soliman, has been charged in the
attack. Federal officials said Soliman had overstayed his tourist visa
and had an expired work permit — although Egypt is not on the list of
countries facing travel limits-During his first term in office, Trump
announced a ban on travelers from several Muslim-majority nations, a
policy that went through several iterations before it was upheld by the
Supreme Court in 2018.Former US president Joe Biden, a Democrat who
succeeded Trump, repealed that ban — which applied to nationals from
Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen — in 2021, calling it “a stain
on our national conscience.”Trump said the countries subject to the most
severe restrictions were determined to harbor a “large-scale presence
of terrorists,” fail to cooperate on visa security and have an inability
to verify travelers’ identities, inadequate record-keeping of criminal
histories and high rates of visa overstays in the United States.“We
cannot have open migration from any country where we cannot safely and
reliably vet and screen those who seek to enter the United States,”
Trump said.Haiti, which avoided the travel ban during Trump’s first
term, was also included for high overstay rates and large numbers who
came to the US illegally. Haitians continue to flee poverty, hunger and
political instability while police and a UN-backed mission fight a surge
in gang violence, with armed men controlling at least 85 percent of its
capital, Port-au-Prince.“Haiti lacks a central authority with
sufficient availability and dissemination of law enforcement information
necessary to ensure its nationals do not undermine the national
security of the United States,” Trump wrote.International aid groups and
refugee resettlement organizations roundly condemned the new ban. “This
policy is not about national security — it is about sowing division and
vilifying communities that are seeking safety and opportunity in the
United States,” said Abby Maxman, president of Oxfam America.Being in
the US a ‘big risk’The Iranian government offered no immediate reaction
to being included. The Trump administration called it a “state sponsor
of terrorism,” barring visitors except for those already holding visas
or coming into the US on special visas America issues for minorities
facing persecution.Somalia immediately pledged to work with the US to
address security issues.“Somalia values its longstanding relationship
with the United States and stands ready to engage in dialogue to address
the concerns raised,” Dahir Hassan Abdi, the Somali ambassador to the
United States, said in a statement.Venezuelan Interior Minister Diosdado
Cabello, a close ally of President Nicolas Maduro, responded on
Wednesday evening by describing the US government as fascist and warning
Venezuelans of being in the US.“The truth is being in the United States
is a big risk for anybody, not just for Venezuelans… They persecute our
countrymen, our people for no reason.”A spokesperson for the
Taliban-led Afghan foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a
request for comment. Pakistan’s foreign ministry did not immediately
reply to a request for comment on how it would handle the thousands of
Afghans waiting in Islamabad who had been in the pipeline for US
resettlement.Calls early on Thursday to the spokesperson of Myanmar’s
military government were not answered.Trump’s presidential campaign
focused on a tough border strategy, and he previewed his plan in an
October 2023 speech, pledging to restrict people from the Gaza Strip,
Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen, and “anywhere else that threatens our
security.”Trump issued an executive order on January 20 requiring
intensified security vetting of any foreigners seeking admission to the
US to detect national security threats.
IAEA chief: Syria to give
inspectors immediate access to suspected former nuclear sites-UN
watchdog’s head Rafael Grossi says officials will look at 4 locations,
including Deir Ezzor facility Israel bombed in 2007; says open to
Damascus pursuing non-weapon program-By AP and ToI Staff Today, 1:27
pm-JUN 5,25
DAMASCUS, Syria — Syria’s new government has agreed
to give inspectors from the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog access to
suspected former nuclear sites immediately, the agency’s head told The
Associated Press on Wednesday.The International Atomic Energy Agency’s
director-general, Rafael Mariano Grossi, spoke in an exclusive interview
in Damascus, where he met with President Ahmed al-Sharaa and other
officials.He also said Sharaa expressed an interest in pursuing nuclear
energy for Syria in the future, adding, “Why not?”The agency’s aim is
“to bring total clarity over certain activities that took place in the
past that were, in the judgment of the agency, probably related to
nuclear weapons,” Grossi said. He described the new government as
“committed to opening up to the world, to international cooperation” and
said he is hopeful of finishing the inspection process within months.An
IAEA team in 2024 visited some sites of interest while former president
Bashar al-Assad was still in power. Since the fall of Assad in
December, the IAEA has been seeking to restore access to sites
associated with Syria’s nuclear program.Syria under Assad is believed to
have operated an extensive clandestine nuclear program, which included
an undeclared nuclear reactor built by North Korea in eastern Deir Ezzor
province.The IAEA described the reactor as being “not configured to
produce electricity” — raising the concern that Damascus sought a
nuclear weapon there by producing weapons-grade plutonium.The reactor
site only became public knowledge after Israel launched airstrikes in
2007 destroying the facility. Syria later leveled the site and never
responded fully to the IAEA’s questions.Israel only formally confirmed
that it had been behind the 2007 bombing of the Deir Ezzor facility in
2018.In the immediate aftermath of the strike, known to much of the
world as Operation Orchard, the view that prevailed in Israel at the
time was that keeping news of what had been done as quiet as possible
would help Assad save face and prevent him from feeling he had to
retaliate, which could have led to all-out war.Grossi said inspectors
plan to return to the reactor in Deir Ezzor as well as to three other
related sites. Other sites under IAEA safeguards include a miniature
neutron source reactor in Damascus and a facility in Homs that can
process yellow-cake uranium.“We are trying to narrow down the focus, to
those or that one that could be of a real interest,” he said.While there
are no indications that there have been releases of radiation from the
sites, he said, the watchdog is concerned that “enriched uranium can be
lying somewhere and could be reused, could be smuggled, could be
trafficked.”He said Sharaa — who has courted Western governments since
taking power — had shown a “very positive disposition to talk to us and
to allow us to carry out the activities we need to.”Apart from resuming
inspections, Grossi said the IAEA is prepared to transfer equipment for
nuclear medicine and to help rebuild the radiotherapy, nuclear medicine
and oncology infrastructure in a health system severely weakened by
nearly 14 years of civil war.“And the president has expressed to me he’s
interested in exploring, in the future, nuclear energy as well,” Grossi
said.A number of other countries in the region, including Saudi Arabia,
the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Jordan, are pursuing nuclear energy
in some form. Grossi said Syria would most likely be looking into small
modular reactors, which are cheaper and easier to deploy than
traditional large ones.Talks on Iran-Regarding the ongoing negotiations
between the United States and Iran for a deal over Tehran’s nuclear
program, Grossi said he has been in “constant contact” with the
parties.“They are negotiating, it’s not us, but it is obvious that the
IAEA will have to be the guarantor of whichever agreement they come to,”
he said.While there continue to be major areas of contention between
the two sides — particularly over uranium enrichment — Grossi said he is
encouraged that they are negotiating, and he believes both sides are
serious about reaching a deal.“I think they both want an agreement,
which doesn’t mean that it’s easy to get, but, simple and obvious as
this may sound, having two sides that want an agreement is an enormous
advantage,” he said. “In my long diplomatic career, I have participated
in negotiations where it was not necessarily the case that the sides
wanted an agreement.”Iran, which avowedly seeks Israel’s destruction,
has consistently denied seeking to acquire nuclear weapons. However, it
has been enriching uranium to levels that have no peaceful application,
has obstructed international inspectors from checking its nuclear
facilities, and has expanded its ballistic missile capabilities, and its
officials have increasingly warned that they could pursue the
bomb.Israel, which sees a nuclear-equipped Iran as an existential
threat, has said it is prepared to strike its nuclear facilities to
prevent Tehran from obtaining a weapon.
Trump orders inquiry into
‘conspiracy’ to hide Biden’s congitive decline-US president signs order
saying that predecessor’s aides used autopen for signatures to conceal
his mental health condition; Biden retorts that the claim is ‘ridiculous
and false’By Agencies Today, 4:28 pm-JUN 5,25
WASHINGTON, United
States — US President Donald Trump on Wednesday ordered an
investigation into what Republicans claim was a “conspiracy” to cover up
Joe Biden’s declining cognitive health during his time in the White
House.The move, which was slammed by Biden, is the latest in a
long-running campaign by Trump — with the backing of Republican Party
politicians and their cheerleaders in the conservative media — to
discredit his predecessor.But it also comes as a growing chorus of
Democrats begins to acknowledge the former president appeared to have
been slipping in recent years.Those concerns were thrown into stark
relief by a disastrous debate performance against Trump during last
year’s presidential campaign, in which the then-81-year-old stumbled
over his words and repeatedly lost his train of thought.“In recent
months, it has become increasingly apparent that former President
Biden’s aides abused the power of Presidential signatures through the
use of an autopen to conceal Biden’s cognitive decline,” a presidential
memorandum issued Wednesday reads.“This conspiracy marks one of the most
dangerous and concerning scandals in American history.”“The American
public was purposefully shielded from discovering who wielded the
executive power, all while Biden’s signature was deployed across
thousands of documents to effect radical policy shifts.”Trump directed
Attorney General Pam Bondi and White House counsel David Warrington to
handle the investigation.‘Ridiculous and false’Biden vehemently denied
the allegations.“Let me be clear: I made the decisions during my
presidency. I made the decisions about the pardons, executive orders,
legislation, and proclamations,” he said in a statement shared with
AFP.“Any suggestion that I didn’t is ridiculous and false,” he said,
slamming the ordered probe as “nothing more than a distraction by Donald
Trump and Congressional Republicans who are working to push disastrous
legislation.”Republicans have long claimed that Biden was suffering from
intellectual decline even as the White House pressed ahead with major
legislation and presidential decrees during his term.They cite his
infrequent public appearances, as well as his apparent unwillingness to
sit for interviews, as evidence of what they say was a man incapable of
doing the demanding job of commander-in-chief of the United States.They
insist that those around him covered up his physical and cognitive
decline, making decisions on his behalf and using a device that could
reproduce his signature to allow them to continue to run the country in
his name.‘Autopen’“The Counsel to the President, in consultation with
the Attorney General and the head of any other relevant executive
department or agency… shall investigate… whether certain individuals
conspired to deceive the public about Biden’s mental state and
unconstitutionally exercise the authorities and responsibilities of the
President,” the document says.The probe will also look at “the
circumstances surrounding Biden’s supposed execution of numerous
executive actions during his final years in office (including) the
policy documents for which the autopen was used (and) who directed that
the President’s signature be affixed.”The Justice Department under
Democratic and Republican administrations has recognized the use of an
autopen to sign legislation and issue pardons for decades, Trump
presented no evidence that Biden was unaware of the actions taken in his
name, and the president’s absolute pardon power is enshrined in the US
Constitution.Meanwhile, House Oversight Chairman James Comer of
Kentucky, a Republican, requested transcribed interviews with five Biden
aides, alleging they had participated in a “cover-up” that amounted to
“one of the greatest scandals in our nation’s history.”Interviews were
requested with White House senior advisers Mike Donilon and Anita Dunn,
former White House chief of staff Ron Klain, former deputy chief of
staff Bruce Reed and Steve Ricchetti, a former counselor to the
president.The Democratic Party is increasingly riven by squabbles about
whether Biden could have been forced to step down earlier to give the
party a chance to find a more popular presidential candidate.Biden’s
former White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Wednesday
criticized the infighting by the Democrats, calling it a “betrayal” of
Biden and announcing her departure from the party as a result.Biden’s
calamitous debate performance ultimately sank his bid for reelection,
with key Democratic Party figures soon calling for him to drop out of
the race.But it was only several weeks later, after unsuccessful
attempts to quieten his critics, that he withdrew, anointing his vice
president Kamala Harris, who eventually lost to Trump.Trump’s claims of a
cover-up were also boosted by news that Biden is suffering from an
“aggressive” prostate cancer, with some voices on the right insisting —
without evidence — the diagnosis must have been known some time ago to
those close to the former president.
Some of the worst hate comes
from the left; there's a sense of betrayal'Boulder’s ‘shocked and
traumatized’ Jewish community takes stock of losses and strengths-After
an antisemitic firebombing attack on Sunday injured 15 people including
an 88-year-old Holocaust survivor, local Jews are finding some measure
of support from outside allies-By Grace Gilson Today, 1:54 pm-JUN 5,25
JTA
— Three days after six of his congregants were burned by a man who
yelled “Free Palestine” as he threw Molotov cocktails, Rabbi Marc
Soloway said his Jewish community remained “very shocked and very
traumatized.”Soloway, who helms Congregation Bonai Shalom in Boulder,
Colorado, rushed to the hospital after learning about the attack.He
often attended the Run for Their Lives, a weekly rally in downtown
Boulder to call attention to the Israeli hostages still being held in
Gaza, but had skipped it on Sunday to prepare for the Shavuot holiday
that began at sundown and lasted until Tuesday night.Celebrations
planned for the holiday gave way to comforting the injured, consoling
the traumatized and becoming a voice and face for a community in
crisis.“It’s been brutal, agonizing, just shocking, unbelievable, just
so many emotions, a lot of grief and pain and sadness, and also quite
significant amounts of anger and just trauma,” Soloway said in an
interview with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency on Wednesday afternoon.He
said that the fact such an attack could take place in 2025 in Boulder is
“incomprehensible.”This was someone who was literally setting fire to
Jewish bodies. It’s just the most horrific thing to imagine-Fifteen
people between the ages of 25 and 88, as well as one dog, were injured
during the attack Sunday, officials said on Wednesday after learning
about more people who had been hurt but not hospitalized.“This was
someone who was literally setting fire to Jewish bodies. It’s just the
most horrific thing to imagine,” Soloway said. “There were literally
Jewish bodies lying on the ground in flames, and it was a pure hate
attack, pure act of terrorism, pure antisemitic attack.”On Wednesday
evening, a crowd filled the Boulder Jewish Community Center for a
community gathering that included testimonials from people who
participated in Sunday’s march and witnessed or were injured in the
attack, songs and poems, and a prayer for the healing of those
injured.“We know that resilience, strength and pride is who we are as
Coloradans, as Boulder County residents and as Jews,” said Colorado Gov.
Jared Polis, who is a member of Boulder’s Jewish community. Earlier on
Wednesday, Polis had hosted an interfaith gathering at the site of the
attack on the Pearl Street Mall.Several local rabbis appeared at both
events, many noting that the community had shown remarkable strength in
the wake of the attack. “There’s been an outpouring of love and support
from within the Jewish community, but there’s also been a tremendous
outpouring of love from outside the Jewish community,” Soloway said on
stage.He also led the crowd in reciting a maxim of Rabbi Zalman
Schachter-Shalomi, the founder Renewal Judaism who spent the last two
decades of his life in Boulder. “The only way to get it together is…” he
said, pausing to allow attendees to end the sentence in unison:
“Together!”Ahead of the event, Soloway said the attack had compounded
feelings of isolation that many in Boulder’s Jewish community have felt
over the last year and a half, during the Israel-Hamas war. City Council
meetings in the largely progressive city have been so swamped by
pro-Palestinian activists seeking to speak and demand a ceasefire
resolution that the council adopted new rules and moved many meetings
online.“Most of us in the Jewish community here in Boulder have been
very progressive and aligned and partnered with a lot of progressive
people. And now some of the worst hateful rhetoric is coming from the
far left, not the far right,” said Soloway. “It’s very confusing and
hurtful. There’s a sense of betrayal.”On Monday night, the City of
Boulder issued a statement acknowledging that the firebombing was a
“targeted, antisemitic attack.”One City Council member, Taishya Adams,
refused to sign the acknowledgement, telling the Boulder Reporting Lab
that she wanted the attack to be characterized as “anti-Zionist”
instead.Soloway said Adams’s decision not to sign the letter felt
“incredibly painful” to him and others in the community.“This isn’t the
time to sort of be analytical about the difference between antisemitism
and anti-Zionism. We just need to name it for what it is,” Soloway said.
“It was a very deliberate targeted attack, someone who wanted to kill
Jews and he wanted, literally, to burn them to death with these homemade
incendiary devices that were just primitive and awful.”Barbara
Steinmetz’s story-Among Soloway’s congregants injured in the attack was
Barbara Steinmetz, an 88-year-old Holocaust survivor who has become one
of the most poignant symbols of the attack.In an interview with NBC News
Tuesday, Steinmetz said she “wants people to be nice and decent to each
other, kind, respectful, encompassing” after being asked what she wants
Americans to know following the attack.“We’re Americans,” she
continued. “We are better than this. That’s what I want them to know.
That they be kind and decent human beings.”Steinmetz was born in Gyor,
Hungary, on November 26, 1936, as the second of two children in an
Orthodox Jewish family. Her family operated a hotel on the island
Lussinpiccolo off the coast of Croatia which at the time belonged to
Italy, according to a talk Steinmetz gave to CU Boulder students for
Holocaust Remembrance Week in 2019.Her family remained in Italy until
1939, when the Italian Racial Laws barred Jews from certain jobs and
ordered Jewish property and businesses to be confiscated.Steinmetz’s
family fled in 1940 to southern France, and eventually made their way to
Lisbon, Portugal, where they obtained visas for the Dominican Republic —
one of the few countries at the time that accepted Jewish refugees.In
1941, when Steinmetz was 4 years old, her family left mainland Europe
and settled in the Dominican Republic before eventually securing visas
for the United States with the help of relatives in 1945, according to
another talk Steinmetz gave at CU Boulder in March.Steinmetz shared her
family’s story with the USC Shoah Foundation in an interview in 1998. In
Boulder, she has spoken at synagogues and schools about the Holocaust
and her family’s escape, her friend Chany Scheiner told the Denver
television station 9News.“She is an amazing person. Not because she is
hurt. She always is an amazing person,” Scheiner said. She added, “She
is passionate about standing up for good things, and she is an extremely
exceptional person. Always a smile on her face. Her life wasn’t easy,
but she is just a bright light.”Steinmetz told NBC News that the attack
“has nothing to do with the Holocaust, it has to do with a human being
that wants to burn other people.”“It’s about what the hell is going on
in our country,” Steinmetz said. “What the hell is going on?”Soloway
declined to speak about Steinmetz to JTA. He told NBC News that
Steinmetz had suffered minor burns in the attack but was “going to be
OK” physically. He said that although her injuries would heal, the
psychological toll of the attack on her remains to be seen.“Can you
imagine the trauma that that reactivates?” Soloway said to NBC News.
“It’s just horrendous.”Hopeful for something positive-The suspect,
Mohamed Sabry Soliman, currently faces a federal charge of a hate crime
and state charges of attempted murder in the first degree and related
charges.Soloway noted that this Sunday, one week after the attack, is
the Boulder Jewish Festival, which locals believe is the longest-running
Jewish festival in the country, and that the community plans to do
another Run for Their Lives walk. This time, marchers from Denver will
be making the 30-mile trek to join them.“We’re hopeful that something
positive will emerge, and that we’ll be a stronger community, in a way;
as much as we’re reeling from the horrors of this attack, we’ll grow,”
Soloway said.
'Aces up the sleeve': Ukraine drone attacks in Russia shake up conflict-By Mathieu RABECHAULT.
Paris
(AFP) June 3, 2025-Ukraine managed to not only humiliate the Kremlin by
boasting of taking out more than a third of all Russian missile
carriers in a spectacular drone attack but also to rewrite the rules of
modern warfare, analysts say.Despite being outnumbered and outgunned,
Kyiv used inexpensive drones at the weekend to destroy Russian
nuclear-capable bombers worth billions of dollars in an operation
carried out after months of planning."Spider's Web" dealt a blow to
Russia more than three years after its invasion of Ukraine, and the
operation will now be studied closely by militaries around the world as a
new strategy in asymmetric warfare.Ukraine said it destroyed $7 billion
worth of Russian aircraft parked at airbases thousands of kilometres
across the border, mainly Tu-95 and Tu-22 long-range strategic
bombers.While the attacks at Belaya deep in Siberia and Olenya on the
Kola Peninsula in the Arctic circle are unlikely to change to course of
the war, they will limit Moscow's ability to launch long-range missile
strikes against Ukraine.Yohann Michel, a researcher at the French
university Lyon-3, said the loss of the aircraft was "a serious blow to
Russian offensive capabilities"."The main impact could be felt in
several weeks' time with a reduction in the number of sorties by the
rest of the fleet" due to difficulties in finding spare parts for the
Soviet-era planes, which are no longer in production, he told AFP.Maxim
Starchak, a fellow at the Centre for International and Defence Policy at
Queen's University in Canada, said it would take Russia a long time to
replace the lost aircraft."Russia is extremely slow and inefficient in
developing new aircraft for its nuclear forces," he told AFP.- New way
of waging war -The drones, launched from trucks in the immediate
vicinity of air bases deep inside Russia, destroyed or damaged aircraft
parked in the open.Congratulating Ukraine's security service chief Vasyl
Malyuk, President Volodymyr Zelensky said it had taken 18 months of
preparation for the 117 drones to be concealed inside trucks close to
the airbases, and that all the Ukrainian agents had safely left
Russia.Michael Shurkin, a former CIA officer, said Ukraine's operation
was likely to have struck fear into militaries across the world, adding
that potential targets for such drone attacks could include refineries,
ballistic missile silos or military bases."This technology is akin to
stealth technology: The threat is difficult to detect both because it
emerges near the target and is too small and too low to be picked up by
sensors designed to catch aircraft or missiles," said Shurkin, director
of global programs for the consultancy 14 North Strategies.Ukrainian
military analyst Oleksii Kopytko said anyone delivering a pizza or
driving a horse-drawn cart could present a danger. "The organisers and
main perpetrators are essentially untraceable," he said.A French arms
manufacturing executive said Ukraine could even have trained AI
algorithms to recognise aircraft or guide the drones in case of
jamming."New tools are forcing us to completely rethink defence systems
and how they are produced," said the executive, who asked not to be
named."It opens up possibilities that we hadn't even imagined."Zelensky
"just proved that he and Ukraine are more than able to pull aces out of
their combat fatigue sleeves," said Timothy Ash, an emerging market
economist focused on Russia.- 'Did not help' -The attacks exposed
Russia's air base vulnerabilities, in a massive morale boost for Kyiv
after months on the backfoot in the conflict."The protection of military
air bases does not meet security requirements," said Starchak. "The
dispersal of military aircraft across different airfields did not help
either."Russia's vast size is also a disadvantage here."Usually, the
vastness of Russia's territory is an advantage; you can hide your
bombers thousands of kilometres away where they would be safe," said
Michel"The problem is that this means you have to monitor thousands of
square kilometres, which is simply impossible."The attacks dealt a blow
to Moscow's nuclear triad of ground, sea and air-launched missiles, said
Starchak.If it was possible to target an airbase it is also possible to
hit bases hosting nuclear submarines, Starchak said."An attack on
long-range aircraft bases is a potential threat to the entire nuclear
triad, which can be easily hit, thereby weakening it to the point that
it cannot respond with a nuclear strike."John Herbst, senior director of
the Atlantic Council's Eurasia Center, said that Ukraine's operation
gave US President Donald Trump leverage against Russia's Vladimir Putin
in search of a settlement."It is a strong counter to the dubious 'common
wisdom' that the war is moving inevitably in Moscow's favour," wrote
the former US ambassador to Ukraine
Ukraine officer tells US that Russia plots big advances-by AFP Staff Writers.
Washington
(AFP) June 5, 2025-A Ukrainian military officer told the United States
on Wednesday that Russian forces are preparing major advances into next
year, including aiming to cut off Black Sea access, as Kyiv pushes for
stronger pressure against Moscow.A senior Ukrainian delegation was
visiting Washington just as President Donald Trump said that his Russian
counterpart Vladimir Putin warned him by telephone of major retaliation
over a daring Ukraine drone strike deep into Russia.Colonel Pavlo
Palisa, who served on the frontlines until President Volodymyr Zelensky
in November named him as deputy head of the president's office,
presented what he said were findings from Ukrainian military
intelligence.Speaking to reporters after briefing US lawmakers and
officials, Palisa said that Russia has set a goal of seizing by the end
of September the entirety of Donetsk and Lugansk -- two of the four
regions that Russia has claimed to have annexed, and which feature in a
Russian proposal that Ukraine terms an ultimatum.By the end of the year,
Russia wants to establish a buffer zone along the Ukraine-Russia
border, Palisa said."It's interesting, but they have plans even for
2026. The plan for next year is to occupy the whole part of Ukraine
which is situated on the left bank of the Dnipro River," he said.The
goal is to "occupy Odessa region and Mykolaiv region, to cut Ukraine's
access to the Black Sea," he said.He did not specify the sources of his
assertions.The Black Sea is militarily and economically critical for
Ukraine and a major route for shipments of grain to the developing
world.The vast Dnipro runs through the capital Kyiv and flows to the
Black Sea, bisecting Ukraine, whose historical legitimacy has been
questioned by Putin.Palisa said the purported intelligence findings on
Russia showed "what they think in reality.""Unfortunately, they are not
speaking about peace. They are preparing for war," he said.Top Zelensky
aide Andriy Yermak, who led the delegation to Washington, encouraged US
lawmakers to move forward on a new sanctions bill to "increase the
pressure on Russia.""It's necessary to create the right atmosphere that
Russia will go to negotiation -- but go not to make a show, but concrete
and real negotiation," Yermak said.Yermak met US Secretary of State
Marco Rubio, who has repeatedly warned that Trump -- who took office
vowing quickly to end the war and who briefly cut off support to Ukraine
-- is losing patience with Putin.
Zelensky tells backers Russia
must be 'forced into diplomacy' as Lukashenko says China, Belarus facing
Western 'pressure'balloon-by AFP Staff Writers.
Brussels,
Belgium (AFP) June 4, 2025-Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky urged
Kyiv's military backers Wednesday to ramp up support in a bid to
pressure Russia towards peace."We must not allow Russia to blur reality
or mislead the world. Moscow must be forced into diplomacy," Zelensky
said in a video address to defence ministers meeting in Brussels.The
call for action comes as Kyiv's main backer the United States has
stepped back from its support for Ukraine under President Donald Trump
and pushed for a quick end to the fighting unleashed by Russian leader
Vladimir Putin.In a sign of Washington's disengagement, US Defense
Secretary Pete Hegseth missed the gathering in Brussels, despite being
due to fly in for a NATO meeting on Thursday.In his address, Zelensky
urged allies to step up deliveries of air defences to ward off Russia's
missile and drone attacks, and to bolster Ukraine's own defence
industry."The stronger our air defence is, the less value Putin sees in
attacking our cities and villages. So please, let's continue
strengthening our air shield," the Ukrainian leader said.Britain's
Defence Secretary John Healey said Russia was "routinely firing over 300
drones a day into Ukraine"."This is a significant shift, and this is a
rate of fire that could be sustained throughout 2025," he said."Three
and a half years into this war, President Putin continues to prove he's
not for peace."Healey's German counterpart Boris Pistorius insisted
Russian forces "are making hardly any progress" on the front line and
suffering devastating losses.He said Russia would eventually fail in its
push to control Ukraine as Kyiv's backers were providing it "with
everything it needs and for as long as it needs"."We will continue to
expand this support, and we will maintain it for the long term," he
said.Despite the soaring rhetoric, there were few public pledges of
concrete new weapon deliveries for Kyiv at the meeting.Britain said it
would step up supplies of drones to Kyiv "tenfold" and the Netherlands
announced naval support worth 400 million euros ($450 million).
Lukashenko says China, Belarus facing Western 'pressure'.
Beijing
(AFP) June 4, 2025 - President Alexander Lukashenko said Belarus and
China are both facing a pressure campaign from the West, as he met with
Xi Jinping in Beijing on Wednesday.Lukashenko told his Chinese
counterpart that their nations are up against "unprecedented pressure"
from the West, according to the Belarusian state news agency
Belta."China will not allow the world order to be broken," Lukashenko
added. "Many, many nations are convinced of this."The Belarusian leader,
who in January won a seventh consecutive term after a widely criticised
election, has ruled ex-Soviet Belarus for more than 30 years.He is in
China for a three-day state visit this week after last visiting in
December 2023.According to state broadcaster CCTV, Xi told Lukashenko
that China has "always viewed and developed its relations with Belarus
from a strategic and long-term perspective".Xi added that China is
"willing to work with Belarus to promote stable and far-reaching
bilateral relations and mutually beneficial cooperation", CCTV said.
Greenpeace steals Macron wax figure for anti-Moscow protest-by AFP Staff Writers.
Paris
(AFP) June 2, 2025-Greenpeace activists on Monday stole a wax figure of
President Emmanuel Macron from a Paris museum and placed it in front of
the Russian embassy as part of a protest against French economic ties
with Moscow in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine.According to a police
source, two women and a man entered the Grevin Museum posing as
tourists and, once inside, changed their clothes to pass for workers.The
activists slipped out through an emergency exit with the wax work,
estimated to be worth 40,000 euros, which they had covered up.The museum
said that the activists had called to promise that the statue would be
returned "unharmed"."They had clearly done their research very
thoroughly," a museum spokeswoman told AFP.According to the spokeswoman,
the activists distracted a security guard by asking a question about a
disabled access lift, while some of them donned maintenance coats.After
making away with the Macron wax figure, the Greenpeace activists placed
it in front of the Russian embassy in a protest against the economic
ties between France and Russia in the gas, chemical fertilizer and
nuclear sectors.The action in front of the embassy lasted only a few
minutes.The activists unfurled a Russian flag behind the Macron statue,
while one man held up a yellow placard reading "Business is
business".The activists also threw fake banknotes around."For us, France
is playing a double game," said Jean-Francois Julliard, head of
Greenpeace France."Emmanuel Macron embodies this double discourse: he
supports Ukraine but encourages French companies to continue trading
with Russia," Julliard said.Julliard said Greenpeace targeted Macron
because he had a particular responsibility, adding that the French
president "should be the first" among European leaders to end trade
contracts with Russia.France has been one of the most vocal supporters
of Kyiv since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.Macron has taken
the lead in seeking to forge a coordinated European response to defend
Ukraine, after US President Donald Trump shocked the world by directly
negotiating with Russia.The wax figure of Jacques Chirac was stolen from
the Grevin Museum in 1983, when he was mayor of Paris. The statue was
found a few days later at the Vincennes Zoo.The statue of Valery Giscard
d'Estaing was stolen by angry motorcyclists during his term at the
Elysee Palace between 1974 and 1981.mca-sm-abe-as/sjw/djt
Iran's Khamenei says US nuclear proposal against national interest-By Payam Doost Mohamadi.
Tehran
(AFP) June 4, 2025-Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said
Wednesday a US proposal for a nuclear agreement was against the national
interest, amid sharp differences over whether Tehran can continue to
enrich uranium.The longtime foes have held five rounds of talks since
April to thrash out a new accord to replace the deal with major powers
that US President Donald Trump abandoned during his first term in
2018.On Saturday, Iran said it had received "elements" of the US
proposal through Omani mediators, the details of which have not been
publicly disclosed."The proposal presented by the Americans is 100
percent against" notions of independence and self-reliance, Khamenei
said in a televised speech, invoking ideals of the 1979 Islamic
revolution."Independence means not waiting for the green light from
America and the likes of America."Iran's enrichment of uranium has
emerged as a major point of contention.Trump said on Monday his
administration would not allow "any" enrichment, despite Tehran's
insistence it is its right under the nuclear Non-Proliferation
Treaty-Khamenei said enrichment is "key" to Iran's nuclear programme and
that the United States "cannot have a say" on the issue."If we have 100
nuclear power plants but don't have enrichment, they will be of no use
to us," because "nuclear power plants need fuel" to operate, he said."If
we cannot produce this fuel domestically, we have to reach out to the
United States, which may have dozens of conditions."The New York Times
reported Tuesday that the US proposal includes "an arrangement that
would allow Iran to continue enriching uranium at low levels" as the US
and other countries "work out a more detailed plan intended to block
Iran's path to a nuclear weapon".It said the proposal would see the
United States facilitating "the building of nuclear power plants for
Iran and negotiate the construction of enrichment facilities managed by a
consortium of regional countries".Iran has previously said it is open
to temporary limits on its enrichment of uranium, and is willing to
consider the establishment of a regional nuclear fuel consortium.But it
has stressed that such a consortium is "in no way intended to replace
Iran's own uranium enrichment programme".Iran's chief negotiator,
Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, said in a Wednesday post on X: No
enrichment, no deal. No nuclear weapons, we have a deal."- 'Less than
satisfactory' -On Monday, Araghchi held talks in Cairo with Rafael
Grossi, head of the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy
Agency.In its latest quarterly report last week, the IAEA said Iran had
further stepped up its production of highly enriched uranium.In a
separate report, it also criticised "less than satisfactory" cooperation
from Tehran, particularly in explaining past cases of nuclear material
found at undeclared sites.Iran currently enriches uranium to 60 percent,
far above the 3.67-percent limit set in the 2015 deal but still short
of the 90 percent threshold needed for a nuclear warhead.The reports
came ahead of a planned IAEA Board of Governors meeting in Vienna later
this month which will review Iran's nuclear activities.Washington and
other Western governments have continued to accuse Iran of seeking a
nuclear weapons capability. Iran insists its programme is for peaceful
purposes only.The 2015 deal provided Iran with relief from international
sanctions in return for UN-monitored restrictions on its nuclear
activities.Trump reimposed US sanctions when he quit the agreement in
2018 and has since tightened them with secondary sanctions against third
parties who violate them.Britain, France and Germany, the three
European countries who were party to the 2015 deal, are currently
weighing whether to trigger the sanctions "snapback" mechanism in the
accord.The mechanism would reinstate UN sanctions in response to Iranian
non-compliance -- an option that expires in October.Iran has criticised
the IAEA report as unbalanced, saying it relied on "forged documents"
provided by its arch foe Israel.
Trump says Iran 'slowwalking' as Khamenei opposes nuclear proposal-by AFP Staff Writers.
Washington
(AFP) June 4, 2025-US President Donald Trump accused Tehran on
Wednesday of "slowwalking" on a nuclear deal, after Iran's supreme
leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said the latest proposal from Washington
was against the national interest.The longtime foes have held five
rounds of talks since April to thrash out a new accord to replace the
deal with major powers that Trump abandoned during his first term in
2018, but sharp differences remain over whether Tehran can continue to
enrich uranium.On Saturday, Iran said it had received "elements" of the
US proposal through Omani mediators, the details of which have not been
publicly disclosed."The proposal presented by the Americans is 100
percent against" notions of independence and self-reliance, Khamenei
said in a televised speech, invoking ideals of the 1979 Islamic
revolution."Independence means not waiting for the green light from
America and the likes of America."Iran's enrichment of uranium has
emerged as a major point of contention.Trump said on Monday his
administration would not allow "any" enrichment, despite Tehran's
insistence it is its right under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.In
a post on Truth Social on Wednesday, Trump said he spoke with Russian
President Vladimir Putin who "suggested that he will participate in the
discussions with Iran"."It is my opinion that Iran has been slowwalking
their decision on this very important matter, and we will need a
definitive answer in a very short period of time!" Trump said.-
Low-level enrichment -Khamenei said enrichment is "key" to Iran's
nuclear programme and that the United States "cannot have a say" on the
issue."If we have 100 nuclear power plants but don't have enrichment,
they will be of no use to us," because "nuclear power plants need fuel"
to operate, he said.The New York Times reported Tuesday that the US
proposal includes "an arrangement that would allow Iran to continue
enriching uranium at low levels" as the US and other countries "work out
a more detailed plan intended to block Iran's path to a nuclear
weapon".It said the proposal would see the United States facilitating
"the building of nuclear power plants for Iran and negotiate the
construction of enrichment facilities managed by a consortium of
regional countries".Iran has previously said it is open to temporary
limits on its enrichment of uranium, and is willing to consider the
establishment of a regional nuclear fuel consortium.But it has stressed
that such a consortium is "in no way intended to replace Iran's own
uranium enrichment programme".Iran's chief negotiator, Foreign Minister
Abbas Araghchi, said in a Wednesday post on X: No enrichment, no deal.
No nuclear weapons, we have a deal."Iran currently enriches uranium to
60 percent, far above the 3.67-percent limit set in the 2015 deal but
still short of the 90 percent threshold needed for a nuclear warhead.-
'Less than satisfactory' -The UN nuclear watchdog, the International
Atomic Energy Agency, said in its latest quarterly report last week that
Iran had further stepped up its production of highly enriched
uranium.In a separate report, it also criticised "less than
satisfactory" cooperation from Tehran, particularly in explaining past
cases of nuclear material found at undeclared sites.The reports came
ahead of a planned IAEA Board of Governors meeting in Vienna later this
month which will review Iran's nuclear activities.Washington and other
Western governments have continued to accuse Iran of seeking a nuclear
weapons capability. Iran insists its programme is for peaceful purposes
only.The 2015 deal provided Iran with relief from international
sanctions in return for UN-monitored restrictions on its nuclear
activities.Trump reimposed US sanctions when he quit the agreement in
2018 and has since tightened them with secondary sanctions against third
parties who violate them.Britain, France and Germany, the three
European countries who were party to the 2015 deal, are currently
weighing whether to trigger the sanctions "snapback" mechanism in the
accord.The mechanism would reinstate UN sanctions in response to Iranian
non-compliance -- an option that expires in October.Iran has criticised
the IAEA report as unbalanced, saying it relied on "forged documents"
provided by its arch foe Israel.pdm-mz/kir/ami/ysm-THE NEW YORK TIMES
COMPANY
Putin ready to 'help resolve' Iran nuclear stand-off: Kremlin.
Moscow,
June 5 (AFP) Jun 05, 2025-Russian President Vladimir Putin is ready to
"help resolve" the standoff between Iran and the United States over
Tehran's nuclear programme, the Kremlin said Thursday."We have a close
partnership with Tehran. And President Putin said that he was ready to
use this partnership to help resolve the Iranian nuclear issue," Kremlin
spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.After a call between the leaders
on Wednesday, US President Donald Trump said Putin had offered to
"participate" in talks on Tehran's nuclear programme, as Trump accused
Iran of "slow-walking" its response to Washington's offer of a
deal.Washington and Tehran have held five rounds of talks since April to
thrash out a new accord to replace the nuclear deal that Trump
abandoned during his first term in 2018.Trump said Monday that his
administration would not allow "any" enrichment of uranium, despite
Tehran's insistence that it has the right under the nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty.Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
said earlier Wednesday that Washington's proposal was against Tehran's
national interest.Russia and Iran have deepened their military ties amid
Moscow's military offensive on Ukraine.The Kremlin said earlier this
week that Tehran had the "right" to a run a peaceful nuclear energy
programme.
Lebanon PM says army has dismantled 500 Hezbollah
sites-IDF strikes underground Hezbollah drone factories in Beirut after
evacuation warning-Military slams ‘blatant violation’ of November
ceasefire, accuses terror group of preparing for future war; 2nd
evacuation warning issued for two sites in southern town of Ain Qana-By
Emanuel Fabian-Today, 11:46 pm-JUN 5,25
The Israel Defense Forces
carried out a series of strikes on several buildings in Beirut’s
southern suburbs on Thursday evening that it said were used by Hezbollah
to manufacture drones, and in a separate instance, also issued
evacuation warnings for two areas in a southern Lebanon town.Ahead of
the strikes, which began shortly after 10 p.m., the military said it had
“identified that Hezbollah’s aerial unit (127) is working to produce
many thousands of UAVs, under the guidance and funding of Iranian terror
officials.”This was happening, the military said, “despite the
understandings between Israel and Lebanon” as laid out in a November
ceasefire agreement that halted more than a year of fighting along
Israel’s northern border.It said that Hezbollah was working to expand
its drone manufacturing process to prepare for a future war with
Israel.“This activity is a blatant violation of the understandings
between Israel and Lebanon. The Hezbollah terror organization creates
challenges for the Lebanese state and thus impairs the implementation of
the understandings,” the IDF asserted.As it generally does before
strikes in Beirut, the military issued an evacuation warning for
civilians in the vicinity of the targeted buildings.“You are located
near facilities belonging to the terrorist organization Hezbollah,” the
IDF’s Arabic-language spokesman, Col. Avichay Adraee, said on X.“For
your safety and the safety of your families, you are required to
evacuate these buildings immediately and move away from them at a
distance of no less than 300 meters,” said Adraee.The post was
accompanied by maps showing the locations of the soon-to-be targeted
buildings.A video circulating on social media following the evacuation
warning showed heavy traffic in Dahiyeh, Beirut, as thousands of people
tried to hurriedly leave the area.AFP photographers reported massive
numbers of people trying to flee the area, and Lebanese media reported
that it was nearly emptied of inhabitants and had been sealed
off.Defense Minister Israel Katz confirmed ahead of the strikes that,
along with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he had “instructed the IDF
this evening to strike and destroy buildings used by the terrorist
organization Hezbollah to manufacture and store drones in the heart of
the Dahiyeh district of Beirut.”“We will continue to enforce the terms
of the ceasefire without any compromises, and we will not allow any
party to make threats against the northern communities and all citizens
of Israel,” said Katz.He stressed that Israel holds the Lebanese
government “directly responsible for preventing violations of the
ceasefire and all terrorist activity against the State of
Israel.”Following the strikes in Beirut, the IDF issued a new evacuation
warning for two areas in the southern Lebanese town of Ain Qana, and
warned that it would soon strike Hezbollah assets in the vicinity.Adraee
again published maps showing the locations of several buildings that
the military intended to target.“You are located near facilities
belonging to Hezbollah,” he said, calling on civilians to evacuate at
least 500 meters from the areas for their safety.Lebanese media reported
a series of strikes in Ain Qana following the warning.Israel has
continued to carry out targeted strikes on Hezbollah operatives and
infrastructure since it signed a ceasefire with Lebanon in late
November, alleging violations of the truce agreement.According to the
IDF, over 180 Hezbollah operatives have been killed in that time.The
ceasefire agreement brought to an end more than a year of fighting with
the Iran-backed Hezbollah, including two months of open war in southern
Lebanon late last year.Hezbollah began attacking military outposts and
communities in northern Israel unprovoked on October 8, 2023, in a show
of support for fellow Iranian proxy Hamas in Gaza after its assault on
southern Israel a day earlier.Under the terms of the ceasefire,
Hezbollah was required to withdraw its fighters north of the Litani and
dismantle all military infrastructure in southern Lebanon.Since then,
the Lebanese state has been working methodically to dismantle the terror
group’s infrastructure in the south of the country, and is estimated to
have seized the majority of the terror group’s weapons stockpile in the
same area.Earlier on Thursday, Lebanon’s Prime Minister Nawaf Salam
said that the Lebanese Armed Forces had dismantled “more than 500
military positions and arms depots” belonging to Hezbollah in the south
of the country.”In a televised address marking 100 days in office, Salam
said his government was pressing ahead with reforms demanded by the
international community.“The state continues its action… to restore its
authority over the entire national territory… and to have a monopoly on
arms,” he said.“The Lebanese army is continuing its deployment and has
so far dismantled more than 500 military positions and arms depots south
of the Litani River” about 30 kilometers (18 miles) from the Israeli
border, Salam said.The Lebanese premier also criticized Israel for
maintaining troops at five locations within southern Lebanon, rather
than fully withdrawing as the ceasefire had demanded.“There can be no
security or stability while Israel’s daily violations persist, parts of
our land remain occupied and our prisoners are not freed,” he said.Times
of Israel staff and Agencies contributed to this report.
Czechs sign nuclear deal with S.Korea firm KHNP: PM.
Prague,
June 4 (AFP) Jun 04, 2025-A Czech state-run company signed Wednesday a
deal with South Korea's KHNP to build two nuclear reactors in the EU
country after a court dismissed a bid by France's EDF to block the
deal.A Czech court had blocked the multi-billion-dollar deal in May
after French energy group EDF filed a complaint, questioning the
transparency of the tender which it lost.But a higher court threw out
the ruling on Wednesday over procedural flaws, enabling the government
of Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala to ink the deal."A while ago we
signed an agreement on the supply of two units for the Dukovany nuclear
plant," Fiala told reporters."We did our best to make sure the deal can
be signed the instant the legal obstacles are removed," he said.He
hailed the signature as a "fundamental step on the way to higher energy
security and self-sufficiency".KHNP is due to build the two units at the
southern Czech nuclear plant of Dukovany run by the state-run CEZ
group.The Czech Republic, an EU member of 10.9 million people, relies on
nuclear power -- produced by Dukovany and the Temelin plant also in the
south -- for 40 percent of its electricity consumption.With the two new
units and small modular reactors due to be built by 2050, the share of
nuclear energy is expected to rise to 50 percent as the country shifts
away from burning fossil fuels.Fiala said earlier KHNP won the tender as
its bid was "better in all criteria assessed" than EDF's offer.On
Wednesday, he said KHNP has vowed to hand 60 percent of the contract to
Czech suppliers.KHNP has offered to build the two new units for around
200 billion Czech koruna ($9 billion) each.Prague expected to finalise
the deal with KHNP by March this year, but complaints by EDF delayed the
process.CEZ expects construction to begin in 2029 and the first new
reactor launched in trial operation in 2036.frj/lth
US military announces detention of Islamic State leader-by AFP Staff Writers.
Washington
(AFP) June 5, 2025-US military officials announced Wednesday the
detention of an Islamic State group (IS) leader during international
coalition operations in Iraq and Syria which also killed two other
operatives.US Central Command wrote on X that the operations, conducted
from May 21 to 27, "served to disrupt and degrade" IS's ability to
"reconstitute, plan, organize and conduct attacks against civilians and
US and partner forces in the region."In the course of supporting six
operations in the ongoing campaign, five in Iraq and one in Syria, the
US military reported two IS operatives were killed, two were detained --
including an IS leader -- and multiple weapons were
recovered."Operations like these underscore the commitment of USCENTCOM,
along with our allies and partners, to the enduring defeat of ISIS in
the region," USCENTCOM Commander Michael Erik Kurilla said in a
statement.The operations in Iraq were carried out by Iraqi forces in the
north, where IS cells have remained active and carry out sporadic
attacks against Iraq's army and police.IS in 2014 declared a "caliphate"
after capturing large parts of Iraq and Syria, beginning a rule marked
by atrocities.Iraqi forces backed by the international coalition
defeated IS in late 2017. The group lost its last territory in Syria two
years later.The group has, however, maintained a presence in Syria's
northeast where it notably targets Kurdish-led forces, and in Iraq it
largely carries out attacks in rural areas.About 2,500 American troops
are deployed in Iraq, which now considers its security forces capable of
confronting the jihadists.The US and Iraq announced in late September
that the international coalition would end its decade-long military
mission in federal Iraq within a year, and by September 2026 in the
autonomous Kurdistan region.During his recent Gulf tour, US President
Donald Trump met with Syria's interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa in Saudi
Arabia and announced lifting sanctions on Syria.
US to eventually reduce military bases in Syria to one: US envoy.
Istanbul
(AFP) June 3, 2025 - The United States has begun reducing its military
presence in Syria with a view to eventually closing all but one of its
bases there, the US envoy for the country has said in an interview.Six
months after the ouster of longtime Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad, the
United States is steadily drawing down its presence as part of Operation
Inherent Resolve (OIR), a military task force launched in 2014 to fight
the Islamic State group (IS)."The reduction of our OIR engagement on a
military basis is happening," the US envoy for Syria, Tom Barrack, said
in an interview with Turkey's NTV late on Monday."We've gone from eight
bases to five to three. We'll eventually go to one."But he admitted
Syria still faced major security challenges under interim leader Ahmed
al-Sharaa, whose Islamist-led coalition toppled Assad in
December.Assad's ouster brought an end to Syria's bloody 14-year civil
war, but the new authorities have struggled to contain recent bouts of
sectarian violence.Barrack, who is also the US ambassador to Turkey,
called for the "integration" of the country's ethnic and religious
groups."It's very tribal still. It's very difficult to bring it
together," he said.But "I think that will happen," he added.The Pentagon
announced in April that the United States would halve its troops in
Syria to less than 1,000 in the coming months, saying the IS presence
had been reduced to "remnants".
South Korea's new leader vows to 'heal wounds' with nuclear-armed North.
Seoul,
June 4 (AFP) Jun 04, 2025-South Korea's President Lee Jae-myung vowed
to reach out to the nuclear-armed North and "heal wounds" as he took
office Wednesday, after winning a snap election triggered by his
predecessor's disastrous martial law declaration.South Korea's new
centre-left leader also warned that "rising protectionism and supply
chain restructuring" pose an existential threat to Asia's
export-dependent fourth-largest economy, which has been buffeted by the
global trade chaos sparked by US President Donald Trump.Lee scored a
thumping victory over conservative Kim Moon-soo of the disgraced
ex-president's former party. His term began immediately after the vote
tally was certified Wednesday.Lee secured 49.4 percent of the vote,
ahead of the 41.2 percent for Kim -- who conceded, having been hampered
by party infighting and a third-party candidate splitting the right-wing
vote.Lee spoke to South Korea's top military commander and formally
assumed operational control of the country's armed forces Wednesday,
urging them to maintain "readiness" in case of Pyongyang's provocations
-- but said in his first comments that he was ready to talk."We will
heal the wounds of division and war and establish a future of peace and
prosperity," he said."No matter how costly, peace is better than war."He
said Seoul would "deter North Korean nuclear and military provocations
while opening communication channels and pursuing dialogue and
cooperation to build peace on the Korean Peninsula".Lee took office just
hours before US tariffs on steel and aluminium were due to take effect,
with the 50 percent levy hitting crucial South Korean exports."The
rapid changes in the global order such as rising protectionism and
supply chain restructuring pose a threat to our very survival," Lee
said.Markets reacted favourably to the election, with the benchmark
KOSPI and the won rising Wednesday.- 'Significant departure' -Lee's
comments on North Korea are a "significant departure" from those of his
hawkish predecessor as he did not immediately attach preconditions to
dialogue, said Hong Min, a senior analyst at the Korea Institute for
National Unification.It signals "his desire to resolve disagreements
through talks", Hong told AFP.Lee held a modest inauguration ceremony at
the National Assembly -- where Yoon deployed armed troops on the night
he attempted to suspend civilian rule.Lee also announced a number of top
appointments, including long-time adviser Kim Min-seok as prime
minister and former unification minister Lee Jong-seok as spy
chief.Lee's day is expected to end with a flurry of congratulatory phone
calls from world leaders, with Trump likely to be the first on the
line.Trump's top diplomat, Marco Rubio, was swift to offer his own
congratulations and voice hope for working with Lee, who previously
sought greater distance from the United States.Washington's alliance
with Seoul was "ironclad", the US secretary of state said, citing
"shared values and deep economic ties".In a statement, the White House
described the election as "free and fair".But it added: "The United
States remains concerned and opposed to Chinese interference and
influence in democracies around the world".Chinese President Xi Jinping
congratulated Lee, while emphasising the "great importance to the
development of China-South Korea relations"."The Chinese side is willing
to work with the South Korean side to ... firmly maintain the direction
of good-neighbourly friendship, adhere to the goal of mutual benefit
and win-win," Xi said, according to state media CCTV.Japanese Prime
Minister Shigeru Ishiba also said he wanted to "energise cooperation"
between Seoul and Tokyo, South Korea's former colonial ruler.And India's
Narendra Modi said on X he wanted to "strengthen" ties with Seoul as he
congratulated Lee.- 'Positive direction' -Lee comes to power with his
party already holding a parliamentary majority -- secure for the next
three years -- meaning he is likely to be able to get his legislative
agenda done.On the streets of Seoul, South Koreans said they welcomed
Lee's overtures to the North."Since our economy and many other aspects
of society are closely linked to the state of inter-Korean relations, I
hope we can take a long-term perspective and move in a more positive
direction," Choi Ki-ho, 55, told AFP.Lee Ju-yeon, a 42-year-old
quasi-public sector employee, said they hoped Lee "will devote himself
to uniting our divided nation".kjk-hs-oho-cdl/lb
UK nuclear site could leak until 2050s, MPs warn.
London,
June 4 (AFP) Jun 04, 2025-Britain's most hazardous building threatens
to leak radioactive water until the 2050s unless the clean-up of a
former nuclear power plant is quickened, UK lawmakers warned on
Wednesday.The waste has been leaking into the ground from a storage silo
at the Sellafield facility in Cumbria, in northwest England, since 2018
-- enough to fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool every three
years.Sellafield, which began operations in the 1940s, generated nuclear
power between 1956 and 2003.In a report published Wednesday, a group of
British MPs criticised the pace of the decommissioning work, citing
examples of "failure, cost overruns and continuing safety concerns".It
said the risks were highlighted by the Magnox Swarf Storage Silo (MSSS),
described by Sellafield owner the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority
(NDA) as "the most hazardous building in the UK".The report by the
Public Accounts Committee found that most of the annual targets for
retrieving waste from buildings at the site, including the MSSS, had
been "missed".It said the storage silo is likely to continue leaking
until the oldest section of the building has been emptied in the late
2050s, instead of 2040 as previously expected."Every day at Sellafield
is a race against time to complete works before buildings reach the end
of their life," said the committee's chair, Geoffrey Clifton-Brown."Our
report contains too many signs that this is a race that Sellafield risks
losing," he added, saying the site presented "intolerable risks".The
radioactive leak is contained and does not pose a risk to the public,
the report noted.A spokeswoman for the NDA said fixing it was the
group's "highest priority".Britain's National Audit Office forecast last
October that the cost of decommissioning and cleaning up the entire
Sellafield site over the next century had soared to pound136 billion
($177 billion).This was up almost 19 percent on the previous official
estimate made in 2019.It noted that "full site remediation" was not
expected until 2125.
IAEA head in Damascus to discuss nuclear power.
Damascus,
June 4 (AFP) Jun 04, 2025-UN nuclear watchdog head Rafael Grossi said
Wednesday his agency and Syrian authorities would begin "exploring the
possibility of nuclear power", on his first visit to Damascus since the
ouster of Bashar al-Assad.The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
has repeatedly been at loggerheads with Syria in the past over what it
says are "unresolved issues" regarding suspected nuclear activities.On
his visit, the IAEA chief met with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa and
Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani."Honoured to meet Syrian President
Ahmed al-Sharaa in Damascus. I recognise his courage in cooperating with
full transparency to close a chapter of Syria's past that diverted
resources necessary for development," Grossi said in a post on X.He said
the two sides "will also begin exploring the possibility of nuclear
power in Syria"."Our cooperation is key to closing outstanding issues
and focusing on the much needed help IAEA can provide Syria in health
and agriculture," he added.The IAEA has urged Syria repeatedly to
cooperate fully with the agency in connection to a suspected nuclear
reactor at the Deir Ezzor desert site.Israel in 2018 admitted carrying
out a top-secret air raid in 2007 against what it said was a nuclear
reactor under construction at the site in eastern Syria.Syria had denied
it was building a nuclear reactor.Grossi visited Damascus in March last
year, meeting then president Assad who was overthrown in December after
nearly 14 years of civil war.Grossi told an IAEA Board of Governors
meeting in March this year that he had requested Syria's cooperation to
"fulfil our obligation to verify nuclear material and facilities" and to
"address unresolved issues"."Clarifying these issues remains essential
to Syria demonstrating its commitment to nuclear non-proliferation and
international peace and security," he said at the time.
China lead mine plan weighs heavily on Myanmar tribe.
Pekon,
Myanmar, June 5 (AFP) Jun 05, 2025-Hundreds of protesting Myanmar
tribespeople march up a hillside to a cavernous facility where a Chinese
joint venture's giant milling machines stand ready to grind up the
rocks of their ancestral homeland for lead ore.Demand for the heavy
metal is forecast to rise, driven by its use in the batteries needed for
the global energy transition.But its extraction can pollute the
environment and the Pradawng tribespeople carry banners reading: "No
transparency, no responsibility"."We don't have any plan to exchange
this inheritance from our ancestors for money or riches," said
24-year-old protest leader Khun Khine Min Naing."This land is the
dignity of our tribe."Since a 2021 coup, Myanmar has been riven by civil
war and shattered into a patchwork of loosely governed territories ripe
for exploitation by unregulated miners.And neighbouring China is keen
to scoop up the minerals and metals Myanmar can supply.The Pradawng -- a
little-known subtribe of the Kayan ethnic group -- claim around 3,000
members and a 381-year lineage in Shan state, in Myanmar's east.They say
Myanmar firm Four Star Company and a Chinese partner have planned a
mega-project mining lead upriver from their village, Thi Kyeik, in Pekon
township.Heavy machinery began to be installed in February, but the
tribe say they were not consulted on the scheme and fear it will taint
the area with hazardous chemicals.Locals have blockaded roads to turn
back vehicles, and threatened to seize mining equipment, defying
possible violent backlash in a country where the right to assemble often
depends on the whims of armed guards."We are only asking for Indigenous
rights that we should own," Khun Khine Min Naing told AFP, demanding
mine plans are rolled back until the war is over and they can be
scrutinised by a civilian government.- Natural resources -Lead is a
toxic metal, most commonly mined for use in lead-acid
batteries.Extracting it can pollute local soil and water supplies, with
children particularly vulnerable to exposure, according to the World
Health Organization (WHO)."We don't want to leave this land
environmentally damaged for the next generation," said Khun Khine Min
Naing. "We don't want to be regarded as historical criminals."The
Pradawng say Four Star Company has been active locally for two decades
and is linked to the local ruling Kayan New Land Party, whose armed wing
maintains a ceasefire with Myanmar's military.The firm could not be
reached for comment.Their Chinese partner company is harder to identify,
and locals say its involvement was only revealed when its
representatives attended a joint event with Four Star Company intended
to address community backlash.China shares a 2,100-kilometre
(1,300-mile) border with Myanmar and has long been a lucrative market
for the country's natural resources, including jade, gemstones, teak
logs and metal ores.It accounts for nearly 98 percent of Myanmar's lead
ore and concentrate exports, according to 2023 World Bank data.The
figures say 49,000 tonnes worth $20 million were exported to China that
year, but that is likely far short of the true amount.The lack of a
central authority means tracking the real scale of mining operations
across Myanmar is difficult.But satellite imagery analysis of one
hotspot on the Myanmar-China border by the Britain-based Centre for
Information Resilience showed the expanse of mining operations there
nearly doubled in size between 2018 and 2024.- 'Only stones for our
children' -Rechargeable lead-acid batteries are widely used in vehicles,
including EVs where they provide auxiliary power, as well as for
storing power generated by renewable technologies such as wind and
solar.The metal -- identified by the WHO as "one of 10 chemicals of
major public health concern" -- sells for around $2,000 per refined
tonne on the global market.But the Pradawng people suspect they will see
none of the profits.Along with health risks, locals fear environmental
damage, with villagers saying increased mining in recent years has led
to more flooding and mudslides that carried off entire homes.Mu Ju July,
19, ekes out a living picking through mine slag heaps for scraps of
lead to sell.A flurry of prospecting could be a windfall for her, but
she worries it will squander the livelihoods and homes of future
generations."If we allow them, we will be okay for only one or two
years," she said."It will leave only stones when the time comes for our
children."
NATO looks to thrash out spending deal under US pressure.
Brussels,
Belgium, June 5 (AFP) Jun 05, 2025-US defence chief Pete Hegseth will
seek on Thursday to drive home a deal on ramping up NATO defence
spending that can satisfy President Donald Trump at a summit later this
month.The volatile US leader has demanded that alliance members agree to
boost defence spending to five percent of their GDP at the June 24-25
meeting in The Netherlands.NATO chief Mark Rutte has put forward a
compromise agreement for 3.5 percent of GDP on core military spending by
2032, and 1.5 percent on broader security-related areas such as
infrastructure.Multiple diplomats say that Rutte looks on track to
secure the deal for the summit in The Hague -- but that some allies are
still hesitant about committing to such spending."I'm really,
absolutely, positively convinced that at the summit with the 32, we will
come to an agreement when it comes to this really big increase in
defence spending," the NATO chief said on Wednesday.Most vocal in its
reluctance is Spain, which is only set to reach NATO's current target of
two percent of GDP by the end of this year.Diplomats say that other
countries are also haggling over making the timeline longer and dropping
a demand for core defence spending to increase by 0.2 percentage points
each year.But the deal appears an acceptable compromise to most that
will allow Trump to claim that he has achieved his headline demand,
while in reality setting the bar lower for struggling European
allies.Hegseth looks set to use a meeting with his NATO counterparts in
Brussels to pressure them into signing up to the agreement.The United
States has backed Rutte's plan -- but its ambassador to NATO insisted on
Wednesday that Washington wants to see "plans, budgets, timelines,
deliverables" to meet the target.In a connected move, NATO ministers
will sign off at their meeting in Brussels on new capability targets for
the weaponry needed to face the threat from Russia.NATO officials have
estimated that, on average, meeting the new targets would cost countries
between 3.5 and 3.7 percent of GDP.Hegseth, a former TV presenter,
rocked NATO on his last visit in February with a fiery warning that
Washington could look to scale back its forces in Europe to focus on
China.Since then there has been no concrete announcement from the United
States on troop withdrawals but NATO allies remain on tenterhooks.-
Ukraine question -With NATO appearing headed for the defence spending
deal, another thorny issue now threatens to overshadow the summit in
three weeks time: what to do about Ukraine?Trump's return to the White
House ripped up Washington's support for Ukraine and upended the West's
approach to Russia's three-year-long war.Hegseth underlined US
disengagement with Kyiv by skipping a meeting of Ukraine's backers in
Brussels on Wednesday.Kyiv's European allies are pressing strongly to
overcome US reluctance and invite Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky
to The Hague as a sign of support.So far, NATO has only said that
Ukraine will be represented at the gathering -- but has not confirmed
that Zelensky will be in attendance.
Chinese researchers charged with smuggling fungus into .
Washington,
June 4 (AFP) Jun 04, 2025-Two Chinese scientists have been charged with
allegedly smuggling a toxic fungus into the United States that they
planned to research at an American university, the Justice Department
said Tuesday.Yunqing Jian, 33, and Zunyong Liu, 34, are charged with
conspiracy, smuggling, false statements, and visa fraud, the US
Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Michigan said in a
statement.Jian is in US custody while Liu's whereabouts are unknown.The
Justice Department said the pair conspired to smuggle a fungus called
Fusarium graminearum into the United States that causes "head blight," a
disease of wheat, barley, maize, and rice.The fungus is classified in
scientific literature as a "potential agroterrorism weapon," it said,
and causes billions of dollars in losses each year.It causes vomiting,
liver damage, and reproductive defects in humans and livestock, it
said.According to the complaint, Jian and Liu, her boyfriend, had both
previously conducted work on the fungus in China."(Liu) first lied but
then admitted to smuggling Fusarium graminearum into America... so that
he could conduct research on it at the laboratory at the University of
Michigan where his girlfriend, Jian, worked," the Justice Department
said.US Attorney Jerome Gorgon Jr described the smuggling of the fungus
into the United States as a "national security" concern and emphasized
Jian's membership in the Chinese Communist Party."These two aliens have
been charged with smuggling a fungus that has been described as a
'potential agroterrorism weapon' into the heartland of America, where
they apparently intended to use a University of Michigan laboratory to
further their scheme," Gorgon said.Chinese foreign ministry spokesman
Lin Jian said he was not aware of the case when asked for comment at a
regular news briefing on Wednesday."The Chinese government has always
required Chinese citizens overseas to strictly abide by local laws and
regulations, and at the same time safeguards the legitimate rights and
interests of Chinese citizens overseas in accordance with the law," he
said.US Secretary of State Marco Rubio vowed last week to "aggressively
revoke visas" for Chinese students, a move condemned by Beijing as
"unreasonable" and "discriminatory."Kseniia Petrova, a scientist from
Russia at Harvard, is facing potential deportation after she failed to
declare biological samples in her luggage upon returning from a trip to
Paris.
Israel arms exports hit all time high in 2024; As Spain cancels anti-tank missiles from Israel-by AFP Staff Writers.
Jerusalem
(AFP) June 4, 2025-Israel's defence ministry said Wednesday that its
arms exports hit an all-time high of more than $14.7 billion in 2024,
with a sharp rise in deals with Arab Gulf states, despite international
criticism of Israel's ongoing war against Hamas in Gaza."Israel again
reached an all-time peak in defence exports in 2024, marking the fourth
consecutive record-breaking year in the scope of defence agreements,"
the ministry, which oversees and approves the exports of Israel's
defence industries, said in a statement.A majority -- 56.8 percent -- of
the deals signed were "mega-deals" valued at at least $100 million
each, the ministry said, adding that "operational achievements" in the
Gaza war had driven the demand.Since the outbreak of the war, sparked by
militant group Hamas's attack on October 7, 2023, the ministry said it
had been operating on "emergency mode, mobilising for the war effort
with round-the-clock IDF production while maintaining foreign client
manufacturing.""The war's operational achievements and the proven
battlefield performance of Israeli systems have driven strong
international demand for Israeli defense technology, concluding 2024 on a
remarkably high note with record-breaking export deals," it said.The
ministry said that demand for its missiles, rockets, and air defence
systems had "reached a new significant milestone" and accounted for some
48 percent of the total number of exports, up from 36 percent in
2023.Additionally, "satellite and space systems exports saw substantial
growth, representing 8 percent of deals in 2024 compared to 2 percent in
2023," the ministry said.A breakdown of the regions to which the arms
were exported showed that European countries made up more than
half.Sales to countries considered part of the Abraham Accords -- the
United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco who signed groundbreaking
normalisation agreements with Israel in 2020 -- appeared to have sharply
risen from 3 percent in 2023 to 12 percent."Precisely during a
difficult and complex year of war, Israel has broken an all-time record
in defence exports," Defence Minister Israel Katz said in the
statement."The world sees Israeli strength and seeks to be a partner in
it," he added.
Spain cancels purchase of Israeli anti-tank missiles: reports.
Madrid
(AFP) June 4, 2025 - Spain, which has strongly criticised Israel's
offensive in Gaza, has cancelled a contract to buy 168 firing posts and
1,680 anti-tank missiles from Israeli defence company Rafael, Spanish
media reported Wednesday.The deal was worth 287.5 million euros ($327
million), according to top-selling daily Spanish newspaper El Pa�s,
which cited unnamed government sources.The equipment was to be
manufactured in Spain under licence from Rafael.Spanish defence ministry
sources told AFP that the government "has begun a process to revoke
licences of Israeli origin" and was working to redirect its procurement
programmes "with the goal of achieving greater technological
independence and autonomy".Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez's
criticisms of the offensive in Gaza infuriated Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu's government last year by recognising a Palestinian
state.In late April, Spain cancelled a contract to buy bullets from
another Israeli company, IMI Systems, following pressure from the
Socialist-led government's far-left coalition partner Sumar -- a move
swiftly condemned by Israel.Labour Minister Yolanda Diaz, the founder of
Sumar, said at the time that Spain could not engage in "business with a
genocidal government... that is massacring the Palestinian
people".Sanchez's government said it halted weapons transactions with
Israel after the start of the war following Hamas's attack on Israel on
October 7, 2023.But according to Centre Delas, a Barcelona-based think
tank specialising in security and defence, the government has granted 46
contracts worth more than 1 billion euros to Israeli companies based on
data published on a public tenders platform.
US says Columbia
University discriminated against Jews, should lose accreditation-Trump’s
Education Secretary Linda McMahon says New York school violated civil
rights law through ‘deliberate indifference’ to harassment of Jewish
students during Gaza war protestsBy Agencies and ToI Staff Today, 10:34
am-JUN 5,25
The US Department of Education said Wednesday it has
notified a university accreditation body that it believes Columbia
University has violated federal anti-discrimination laws through a
failure to protect Jewish students on its campus.Columbia was an
epicenter of widespread anti-Israel and in some cases antisemitic
protests on campuses across the US last year that saw frequent
expressions of support for the Hamas terror group and its October 7,
2023, attack, on southern Israel, as well as violations of school rules
and local law, and is one of a number of schools whose funding US
President Donald Trump has threatened.“Columbia University looked the
other way as Jewish students faced harassment,” US Education Secretary
Linda McMahon said on X.She accused the Ivy League school of “breaking
Title VI protections,” referring to a national law that prohibits
recipients of federal funding from discriminating on the basis of race,
color, or national origin.“After Hamas’ October 7, 2023, terror attack
on Israel, Columbia University’s leadership acted with deliberate
indifference towards the harassment of Jewish students on its campus,”
McMahon said in a statement.“This is not only immoral, but also
unlawful,” she added.In the statement, the US Education Department said
its civil rights office had contacted Columbia’s accreditor about the
alleged violation.It said it had notified the Middle States Commission
on Higher Education that “its member institution, Columbia University,
is in violation of federal antidiscrimination laws and therefore fails
to meet the standards for accreditation set by the Commission.”It is not
clear how the Middle States Commission, which, like other accrediting
agencies, is independent, will respond to the notification.Withdrawing
Columbia’s accreditation would see it lose access to all federal
funds.Students attending the university would also not be able to
receive federal grants and loans toward tuition.Critics accuse the Trump
administration of using allegations of antisemitism to target
educational elites and bring universities to their knees.The Trump
administration has already put $400 million of Columbia’s funding under
review, prompting the university in March to announce a package of
concessions to the government relating to defining antisemitism,
policing protests and conducting oversight for specific academic
departments.Washington has also sought to deport several prominent
campus activists at Columbia, citing the secretary of state’s authority
to revoke the visas of immigrants who have endorsed terror groups or
whom he otherwise deems a national security threat.Following Wednesday’s
announcement, a Columbia spokesperson said the university is “aware of
the concerns” raised by the government with its accreditor.“We have
addressed those concerns directly with Middle States,” the spokesperson
said, adding that “Columbia is deeply committed to combating
anti-Semitism on our campus.”“We take this issue seriously and are
continuing to work with the federal government to address it.”Columbia
found itself at the center of a firestorm last year over claims of
antisemitism triggered by campus protests over the ongoing war in Gaza
that included harassment of Jewish students, an unauthorized protest
encampment, building takeovers, clashes with police and property
damage.Columbia University Apartheid Divest, the major student coalition
organizing the protests, has called for the “eradication of western
civilization,” distributed Hamas material on campus, backed calls for
violence against “Zionists” and said that “violence is the only
path.”Columbia’s former president Minouche Shafik resigned last August
weeks before the start of the new school year, citing scrutiny she faced
over her handling of the demonstrations.
University slams
'illegal retaliatory step'Trump moves to bar US entry to foreign
students planning to study at Harvard-US president says it would
jeopardize national security to let university keep hosting
international students; tries new legal method after judge blocked
earlier effort-By AP Today, 9:44 am-JUN 5,25
WASHINGTON — US
President Donald Trump on Wednesday moved to block nearly all foreign
students from entering the US to attend Harvard University, amid the
ongoing row between his administration and the university over issues
that include its handling of anti-Israel protests that have often
included open support for terror groups.In an executive order, Trump
declared that it would jeopardize national security to allow Harvard to
continue hosting foreign students on its campus in Cambridge,
Massachusetts.“I have determined that the entry of the class of foreign
nationals described above is detrimental to the interests of the United
States because, in my judgment, Harvard’s conduct has rendered it an
unsuitable destination for foreign students and researchers,” Trump
wrote in the order.It’s a further escalation in the White House’s fight
with the nation’s oldest and wealthiest university. A federal court in
Boston blocked the Department of Homeland Security from barring
international students at Harvard last week. Trump’s order invokes a
different legal authority.Trump invoked a broad federal law that gives
the president authority to block foreigners whose entry would be
“detrimental to the interests of the United States.”On Wednesday, he
cited the same authority when announcing that citizens of 12 countries
would be banned from visiting the US and those from seven others would
face restrictions. Trump connected the policy to the recent violent
attack in Colorado against rally-goers calling for the release of
hostages held by Hamas in Gaza.Trump’s Harvard order cites several other
laws, too, including one barring foreigners associated with terrorist
organizations.In a statement Wednesday night, Harvard said it will
“continue to protect its international students.”“This is yet another
illegal retaliatory step taken by the Administration in violation of
Harvard’s First Amendment rights,” university officials said.It stems
from Harvard’s refusal to submit to a series of demands made by the
federal government. It has escalated recently after the US Department of
Homeland Security said Harvard refused to provide records related to
misconduct by foreign students.Harvard says it has complied with the
request, but the government said the school’s response was
insufficient.The dispute has been building for months after the Trump
administration demanded a series of policy and governance changes at
Harvard, calling it a hotbed of liberalism and accusing it of tolerating
anti-Jewish harassment. Harvard defied the demands, saying they
encroached on the university’s autonomy and represented a threat to the
freedom of all US universities.The administration’s effort comes in the
wake of widespread anti-Israel and in some cases antisemitic protests on
campuses across the US last year that saw frequent expressions of
support for the Hamas terror group and its October 7, 2023, attack, as
well as violations of school rules and local law. It also echoes decades
of criticism by conservatives citing a lack of “viewpoint diversity”
and controversial speech at colleges and universities.Trump officials
have repeatedly raised the stakes and sought new fronts to pressure
Harvard, cutting more than $2.6 billion in research grants and moving to
end all federal contracts with the university. The latest threat has
targeted Harvard’s roughly 7,000 international students, who account for
half the enrollment at some Harvard graduate schools.“Admission to the
United States to study at an ‘elite’ American university is a privilege,
not a right,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a post on X. “This
Department of Justice will vigorously defend the President’s
proclamation suspending the entry of new foreign students at Harvard
University based on national security concerns.”US Rep. Pramila Jayapal,
a Democrat from Washington state, called the measure ridiculous and
said it has nothing to do with national security.“It’s a thinly veiled
revenge ploy in Trump’s personal feud with Harvard, and continued
authoritarian overreach against free speech,” Jayapal said on the social
media site X.The order applies to all students attempting to enter the
United States to attend Harvard after the date of the executive order.
It provides a carve-out to allow students whose entry would “benefit the
national interest,” as determined by federal officials.Trump’s order
alleges that Harvard provided data on misconduct by only three students
in response to the Homeland Security request, and it lacked the detail
to gauge if federal action was needed. Trump concluded that Harvard is
either “not fully reporting its disciplinary records for foreign
students or is not seriously policing its foreign students.”“These
actions and failures directly undermine the Federal Government’s ability
to ensure that foreign nationals admitted on student or exchange
visitor visas remain in compliance with Federal law,” the order said.For
foreign students already at Harvard, Secretary of State Marco Rubio
will determine if visas should be revoked, Trump wrote.The order is
scheduled to last six months. Within 90 days, the administration will
determine if it should be renewed, the order said.A State Department
cable sent last week to US embassies and consulates said federal
officials will begin reviewing the social media accounts of visa
applicants who plan to attend, work at or visit Harvard University for
any signs of antisemitism.In a court filing last week, Harvard officials
said the Trump administration’s efforts to stop Harvard from enrolling
international students have created an environment of “profound fear,
concern, and confusion.” Countless international students have asked
about transferring from the university, Harvard immigration services
director Maureen Martin said in the filing.Times of Israel staff
contributed to this report.
PLANES
ISAIAH 31:5
5 As
birds flying,(PLANES) so will the LORD of hosts defend Jerusalem;(WITH
PLANES) defending also he will deliver it; and passing over he will
preserve it.(NUKE OR BOMB ISRAELS ENEMIES)
AUTOMOBILES
NAHUM 2:3-4
3
The shield of his mighty men is made red, the valiant men are in
scarlet: the chariots(AUTOMOBILES) shall be with flaming torches in the
day of his preparation,(LIGHTS) and the fir trees shall be terribly
shaken.
4 The chariots shall rage in the streets,(DRIVE FAST) they
shall justle(ACCIDENTS) one against another in the broad ways: they
shall seem like torches, they shall run like the lightnings.(LIGHTS AND
FAST)
srael says El Al to begin direct Buenos Aires flights-Axel
Wahnish predicts formal announcement from national carrier will be made
next week, sees long-haul flight as result of improved relations between
two countries-By Juan Melamed Today, 3:01 pm-JUN 5,25
JTA — A
canceled flight on his way to assume his new job might well have added
urgency around one of Rabbi Axel Wahnish’s first big breakthroughs as
Argentina’s ambassador to Israel: direct flights between Tel Aviv and
Buenos Aires.Wahnish, the personal rabbi of Argentine President Javier
Milei, was originally scheduled to depart from Buenos Aires on August
14, 2024, to begin his tenure in Israel. But his Air Europa flight —
which included a connection in Europe — was canceled due to a surge in
tensions between Iran and Israel.As most commercial airlines scrapped
their Tel Aviv routes amid the turmoil, only El Al, Israel’s national
carrier, and its subsidiaries reliably stayed in the air. Now, Wahnish
has announced that El Al will begin flying between Argentina and Israel,
in both a powerful symbol of the countries’ alliance and a practical
boon for travelers like him.El Al has not yet confirmed the flight,
which Wahnish said on X would be formally announced next week, when
Milei, a noted philosemite and Zionist, visits Israel for the second
time.“It’s a question similar to the debate about which came first, the
chicken or the egg,” he said. “As an ambassador, I plan to work on both
fronts — collaborating with airlines to make the route, while also
fostering commercial, cultural, artistic, sporting and educational
exchanges.”Milei’s three-day state visit is set to start on June 9 and
to include meetings with President Isaac Herzog and Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu, a speech before the Knesset, the acceptance ceremony
for the Genesis Prize, a visit to the Western Wall and a meeting with
relatives of the hostages taken during the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led
attacks on Israel that triggered the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip.
Milei is the first non-Jew to be awarded the Genesis Prize.As part of
the trip, Milei and Netanyahu will sign a “Memorandum of Freedom and
Democracy Against Terrorism, Antisemitism, and Discrimination.”The
memorandum formalizes a major shift in Argentina’s foreign policy
following the election of Milei, a self-proclaimed “anarcho-capitalist,”
in 2023 after years of left-wing leadership. In 2013, Argentina signed a
memorandum of understanding with Iran, and for much of the past two
decades, the country maintained close ties with Iran and frequently
criticized Israeli military actions.Under Milei, Argentina has pivoted
toward a stronger alliance with Israel, openly supporting its right to
self-defense and its war in Gaza. At times, Argentina has stood nearly
alone among nations in supporting Israel, and Milei has not joined in as
other allies of Israel, including those with right-leaning leaders,
have urged Netanyahu to end the war.“It is a deep honor and a historic
privilege to express our strong alliance against terror, standing close
to the Israeli democracy that is defending itself from terrorists,”
Wahnish said in the August interview.Wahnish told JTA that his rabbinic
background is a bonus in his work as the ambassador — but not his main
qualification.“First and foremost, I’m an Argentine citizen, a human
being. If someone has expertise in a particular area, whether as a
physicist, engineer or any other skill, can that be a disadvantage?…
No,” he said. “The same applies to being a rabbi. I think it is a plus. I
have an ethical and moral background, a philosophical knowledge, it is
like an extra skill.”But he added, “The strong alliance between our
country and Israel is not rooted in religion. It’s based on values of
democracy and freedom.”At the time, he declined to say when Milei
planned to fulfill his stated intention to relocate the Argentine
embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a move the United States made during
President Donald Trump’s first term in 2018.The embassy move has not
been formalized, with conventional wisdom in Argentina being that Milei
may be waiting until after midterm elections in October to follow
through on his promise.But Wahnish appears to have succeeded in pressing
forward on the direct flights, which he said on X in February were a
“dream of my administration.” At the time, he said he had advocated for
the flights in a direct conversation with Netanyahu, in which they also
discussed Milei’s visit, the memorandum and the Israeli hostages still
being held in Gaza, who include Argentine dual citizens.A direct flight
between the two countries was previously announced in 2017, but it was
never implemented.If the new El Al route becomes a reality, there is
only one precedent — and it hardly offered a model of strong diplomatic
relations.On May 19, 1960, a special Israeli delegation arrived in
Buenos Aires on an El Al flight to attend the 150th anniversary of
Argentine independence.Their visit had a secondary purpose: The
following day, the Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann, whom Mossad agents
had apprehended in Argentina, was disguised as a crew member and
returned to Israel on the same plane. The aircraft stopped to refuel in
Dakar, Senegal, and landed in Israel on May 22, where Eichmann was
arrested. He was later convicted of crimes against humanity and hanged
in 1962.Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.
Op-ed-For
now, victory is still within reach: 10 truths about the Gaza war, 20
months in-Israeli troops are again maneuvering inside Gaza, hoping this
will be the knockout blow; but Hamas is still fighting and doesn’t seem
desperate for a deal By Lazar Berman-Today, 4:12 pm-JUN 5,25
More
than 600 days after the October 7, 2023, Hamas massacre, Israeli
soldiers are once again ramping up an operation that, the country’s
leaders say, is the key to finally winning the war.In the meantime,
hostages remain in Gaza, it is still unclear what exactly will lead to
Hamas’s defeat, and Israel’s standing in the world continues to slip.We
don’t know what will happen next — whether more hostages will be
released, when the war will come to an end, what the promised total
victory will constitute, and what Israel’s relationships abroad will
look like in the aftermath.Still, there are core insights into the war
and its wider context that can help understand where the campaign stands
now, and where it should head in the future.1. Israel’s war against
Hezbollah has been a runaway success…Before Hamas’s October 7, 2023,
invasion and slaughter in southern Israel, the Iran-backed terror group
Hezbollah in Lebanon was far more dangerous and capable than Hamas, and
Israel behaved accordingly over the last decade. A state of mutual
deterrence persisted across Israel’s northern border, as Israel drew up
war plans and Hezbollah did the same, expanding its capabilities as the
years went by.Were conflict to break out with Hezbollah, the IDF
predicted, 2,000 rockets a day would rain down on Israel, taking a
ghastly toll while paralyzing the country.The campaign played out very
differently. Hezbollah entered the war on October 8, 2023, and months of
back-and-forth rocket attacks and airstrikes ensued. Then, after
deciding to escalate in the late summer of 2024, Israel carried out a
series of high-profile operations, detonating booby-trapped beepers and
assassinating the terror group’s Hassan Nasrallah and the leadership of
the elite Radwan force.Demoralized and overwhelmed, Hezbollah couldn’t
do anything to stop Israel’s limited ground invasion, and accepted a
humiliating ceasefire. Israel still has troops in Lebanon and carries
out strikes on Hezbollah targets, with no response from the once-feared
organization.A new president representing the anti-Hezbollah faction is
now in power in Beirut, with firm US and French backing, and the
Lebanese Army has reportedly dismantled most of Hezbollah’s posts and
weapons stockpiles in the country’s south, with the help of Israeli
intelligence.And as a nice bonus, shortly after Hezbollah threw in the
towel, the Bashar Assad regime collapsed in Syria, replaced by a weak
new government that has no interest in conflict with Israel.2. …whereas
the Gaza campaign has been a halting muddle-At the tactical level, the
IDF has performed impressively in Gaza. It can reach anywhere it wants
in the Strip, easily rolled up Hamas defenses early in the war, and has
adapted to the complex challenges presented on a battlefield prepared by
Hamas for 17 years.It has also killed all of Hamas’s top leadership in
Gaza, and the vast majority of its battlefield commanders.Yet Hamas
fights on. And it remains the only force in the Strip able to assert
control over the population: Nearly 20 months after it perpetrated the
worst slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust, Hamas is still not
defeated.Israel has not been clear about how exactly tactical success
leads to the strategic goal of defeating Hamas. Is it through taking
territory? Israel seemed to think so early in the war, boasting about
the areas it had captured — Gaza City, the Netzarim Corridor, the
Philadelphi Corridor, the Rafah Border Crossing.But there is no one
particular piece of territory that Hamas needs to hold onto in order to
outlast Israel. Almost anywhere will do.Perhaps the killing of Hamas
fighters is the key to victory?“Another battalion dismantled, another
commander killed, another infrastructure destroyed, this is the way to
eventually pressure for the release of the hostages,” said then-IDF
chief of staff Herzi Halevi in April 2024.Israel has certainly taken
tens of thousands of Hamas gunmen off the battlefield, severely eroding
Hamas’s effectiveness. Yet there are still thousands left, more than
enough to reassert control and start rebuilding if Israel
withdraws.Another theory of victory sees Hamas’s leadership as its
center of gravity. The IDF has killed Yahya and Mohammed Sinwar, Mohamed
Deif, Marwan Issa, and almost all brigade and battalion commanders. But
the group has not given up or splintered into rival factions.Israel
hasn’t managed to get the population to overthrow Hamas either. There
have been occasional protests, which are either put down by Hamas or
dissipate. Israel plays up these demonstrations, but it hasn’t provide
an incentive for Gazans to turn against Hamas with the promise of a
rapid improvement in conditions. It has tried to get the population to
turn against Hamas by limiting humanitarian aid — but that has failed,
and eroded support for the war among Israel’s allies.It seems to be
quietly arming Gazan criminal clans as well.Now Israel is pursuing the
idea that offering humanitarian aid is the key to victory — provide it,
but keep it out of Hamas hands, and the terrorists lose their funding
and control of the population. The newGaza Humanitarian Fund is designed
to test that proposition. Its rollout has been bloody and chaotic, but
Hamas’s opposition to it is a good sign.It will have to be expanded,
made safer, and supported by other countries and aid organizations in
order to permanently weaken Hamas’s hold over Gazans.3. Israel needs a
‘day after’ vision-For a number of reasons, but primarily coalition
politics, the government refuses to elucidate a clear vision of what
Gaza would look like after Israel’s “total victory.”Hamas is not immune
to military defeat, like so many observers argue. That defeat becomes
much harder to achieve, however, without a plan for alternative
governance. It would give more purpose to military operations, and would
impose an overarching logic on IDF actions.Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu is treating Trump’s “Gaz-a-Lago” idea to resettle Palestinians
as his vision for the future of Gaza, which is a convenient way to
dodge having to actually come up with one.A postwar plan would also
increase international support for Israel’s military campaign.
Legitimacy to continue operations that impose harsh costs on Gaza’s
population is easier to maintain when allies believe that the suffering
is leading to a better future. Without that vision, it’s hard for even
Israel’s closest friends to understand why they should support more
death and hunger.4. Operation Gideon’s Chariots is, so far, no drastic
change-On May 5, a senior Israeli defense official said the IDF would
launch its major offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, dubbed
“Gideon’s Chariots,” if no hostage deal was reached with the terror
group by the end of US President Donald Trump’s visit to the region the
next week.Trump came and went. No deal was reached.The “Gideon’s
Chariots” objective, according to defense officials, is nothing less
than the defeat of Hamas in Gaza and the release of all
hostages.According to one official, “a central component of the plan is
the extensive evacuation of the entire Gazan population from combat
zones, including from northern Gaza, to areas in southern Gaza, while
creating separation between them and Hamas terrorists, in order to allow
the IDF operational freedom of action.”“Unlike in the past, the IDF
will remain in every area that is conquered, to prevent the return of
terror, and will handle every cleared area according to the Rafah model,
where all threats were leveled and it became part of the security
zone,” he said.Though all the IDF’s active ground brigades are in Gaza,
the operation is not a rapid, aggressive one.Instead, it boasts
incremental gains. Military officials say that the IDF is aiming to take
75% of the Strip within two months, and that the army is shifting its
focus away from trying to eliminate as many terrorists as possible to
instead capture territory and destroy Hamas’s infrastructure.A map
shared Tuesday by the IDF showed five divisions moving further into
Gaza.If, for whatever reason — external pressure, troop shortages —
Israeli forces end up leaving these areas, then the much-vaunted
intensified campaign will essentially be a replay of what the IDF has
been doing at the height of its military operations over the past year
and a half.The difference is that the IDF says it intends to hold onto
the captured territory until Hamas gives in. Could that make the
difference? Potentially. But if Hamas’s goal is to simply survive, it’s
not clear why it wouldn’t hunker down along with the rest of the Gazan
population until something changes — US pressure on Israel or another
temporary ceasefire deal.Even as the IDF slowly retakes territory in
Gaza, it’s clear that Israel is still focused primarily for now on
pushing Hamas to accept a hostage deal, not on definitively defeating
Hamas militarily.5. Israel thinks it has all the time in the world…Since
October 7, Israel has operated as if it has no time limits in its Gaza
war.Its initial ground campaign was designed to be slow and deliberate,
not to bring the war to a rapid decision as Israel’s classic military
doctrine holds.With inadequate intelligence on Hamas and the Gaza Strip,
and a lack of confidence in its ability to dust off its ground maneuver
capabilities, the IDF moved slowly in its major ground offensive in
late 2023 and early 2024. It used massive firepower to protect its
forces, which advanced only as fast as its bulldozers could clear
routes.And Israel didn’t attack in multiple sectors simultaneously, as
military doctrine would anticipate. It started with Gaza City, then
shifted to Khan Younis in December, and — faced with threats from the US
Biden administration — only began its Rafah operation in May 2024.A
long war only raises the costs for Israel: more strain on reservists,
more harm to the economy, and more erosion of Israel’s diplomatic
standing.There were some understandable reasons for a slower pace:
Israel doesn’t want to risk striking areas where hostages may be held,
and two hostage deals brought temporary ceasefires.Nevertheless, no rush
has been seen to win the war and move on to building a new future in
Gaza and the region.That is a risky approach. The Trump administration
has given Netanyahu plenty of room to do what he wants with Gaza, but
the longer it remains a problem with no obvious movement toward a
resolution the greater the risk of Trump getting sick of backing the
campaign.Europe and pro-Western Arab states are ramping up their efforts
to end the war, and are sure to bring this goal up in their meetings
with Trump. Eventually, it might work.6. …and has made victory harder to
achieve through a lack of military and political discipline-Israel’s
international legitimacy in the war was always going to start seeping
away, from the moment the IDF’s guns opened fire.In the aftermath of the
October 7 Hamas attack, Israel seemed to think that, given the scale of
the atrocities, no one was going to get in the way of its military
campaign. It did not prioritize limiting civilian casualties, and has
played politics with the provision of humanitarian aid throughout the
war.Both of these mistakes have increasingly pushed allies to call for
an end to the war, without conditioning it on the return of hostages or
the defeat of Hamas.The IDF brass didn’t help either. Active and reserve
soldiers began uploading videos from the battlefield to their social
media accounts for the world to see. Some of it was juvenile tomfoolery;
much was inappropriate partisan opinion; and there was even footage
depicting war crimes.Instead of swiftly cracking down on the
perpetrators, whose videos were collected by anti-Israel groups and by
international courts, the IDF failed to get a handle on the trend.
Strategic and irreversible damage was done to the IDF’s image, and to
the war effort.Government ministers and MKs have caused similar harm in
front of microphones.Agriculture Minister Avi Dichter said the war was
“Gaza’s Nakba.”“Erase Gaza from the face of the earth,” said Likud
lawmaker Galit Distel-Atbaryan. “Let the Gazan monsters rush to the
southern border and flee into Egypt, or die. And let them die badly.
Gaza should be wiped off the map.”Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich
predicted that the Strip would be “totally destroyed.”Such statements
from ministers and lawmakers are a pillar of the International Court of
Justice’s genocide case against Israel.Netanyahu offered tepid
suggestions to his government to take more care with their utterances,
but has not cracked the whip on ministers who harm Israel’s campaign for
their own political gain.It should be noted that the countries
criticizing Israel have adopted a hypocritical stance since the
beginning of the war. They purport to care deeply for the lives of
Gazans, but didn’t demand escape routes for civilians, as they did for
Syrians and Ukrainians. They point to fears of Israel not letting
Palestinians return to Gaza — but shouldn’t it be the personal choice of
individual Gazans whether to protect their physical well-being or risk
the dangers of war in order to hold onto Palestinian land?7. Hamas is
playing to survive-Israel believes time is on its side. Hamas reads the
situation differently. It is convinced that eventually, domestic or
international pressure will force Israel to end the war, which would
mean victory for Hamas.Its entire goal at this stage is to survive the
war with a core of fighters and commanders in Gaza.If it manages that,
it will remain the most powerful force in the Strip. At some point, it
will find the opportunity to slowly rearm, and possibly reassert full
control.This, of course, is the major sticking point in talks with
Hamas. The terror organization insists that any further release
guarantee an end to the war. Israel refuses to grant Hamas victory, and a
deal remains out of reach.8. This government has been very successful
in getting hostages released-Though it faces international opprobrium
and angry protests over the issue — including over its refusal to accept
a deal that would bring home all the hostages in exchange for an end to
the war — the Netanyahu government has managed to free the majority of
hostages. Out of 251 taken on October 7, 148 have made it home alive,
mostly through deals with Hamas, but several through military operations
and sporadic releases by Hamas.Israel has brought home another 51
bodies.Finding a way to free 199 hostages from a ruthless terrorist
organization that revels in the killing of Jews is no small feat. Though
the government may not be formally prioritizing the freeing of the
hostages over the defeat of Hamas, to the ire of much of the country, it
certainly has harmed its own military campaign in order to avoid
endangering hostages and to conduct hostage release deals.It continues
to delay full implementation of the much-ballyhooed ground campaign in
order to keep the door open for another hostage release by Hamas in
exchange for an extended ceasefire.9. Israelis must ask clearly: How
much to give up for 20 hostages? Families of hostages and their
supporters call clearly and loudly for a deal that brings all the
hostages home, at the price of ending the war if necessary.They make a
number of arguments.One is that once Israel brings all of the hostages
home, it can restart the war the minute Hamas violates the terms of the
ceasefire , which it is sure to do.That is simply not realistic. Hamas
is brutal, bloodthirsty, and ruthless, but isn’t stupid. Before giving
up the hostages, its most valuable asset, it would make sure it had
every rock-solid guarantee in place that Israel couldn’t just resume the
fight.The most reliable guarantee is a UN Security Council resolution
imposing a range of harsh sanctions on Israel if it goes back to war.
Hamas can’t initiate such a resolution. But if that’s what stands
between an end to the war and more bloodshed in Gaza, it is absolutely
conceivable that the US, Britain, and France would support it.There is
no way to get all the hostages home if Hamas believes there is any
chance Israel will go back into Gaza-To put it starkly, there is no way
to get all the hostages home if Hamas believes there is any chance
Israel will go back into Gaza.A second, moral argument is that there is
an ethical imperative to bring back the hostages while they are still
alive, and this trumps the goal of destroying Hamas.This approach has
guided Israeli decision-making in its repeated hostage release deals
over the years. It has time and again brought home a small number of
hostages while releasing hardened terrorists, some of whom have gotten
right back to work killing Israelis.According to former Mossad chief
Meir Dagan, 231 Israelis were killed by the terrorists released in the
2004 deal that freed Elhanan Tannenbaum and brought home the bodies of 3
IDF soldiers.Famously, Yahya Sinwar — the Hamas leader who masterminded
October 7 — was one of the 1,027 security prisoners released in the
2011 deal that freed one IDF soldier, Gilad Shalit.There is a difference
this time, however. The previous deals were pure swaps, and did not
force Israel to prematurely end a military campaign.This time, it
would.The decision, then, should be laid out clearly. It’s a choice
between winning a war against a terrorist organization, and saving the
lives of about 20 people — the number of hostages assumed to be alive in
Gaza. Or, as the Hostage and Missing Families Forum says: “Save the
hostages. End the war.”Choosing the lives of the hostages over victory
would not be unprecedented, but would be extremely rare in the history
of war. Russia agreed to halt military operations in Chechnya and engage
in talks after Chechen terrorists took almost 2,000 civilians hostage
in Budyonnovsk in 1995.In 1360, after King John II was captured by the
English, France agreed to cede significant territories to secure the
release of its monarch in the Treaty of Brétigny.But the few obscure
historical examples fly in the face of the logic of war. If the goal was
to avoid the deaths of a small number of citizens, no country would go
to war at all, as wars are fought with the knowledge that soldiers will
be sacrificed for political aims.If Israel’s war to defeat Hamas isn’t
worth the lives of 20 citizens, then why would it be worth the lives of
the 425 soldiers that have fallen in the 20 months of fighting?One could
argue, however, that, given the failure of the security services to
protect the country on October 7, this case is unique. Civilians were
snatched from their homes, off-duty and conscript soldiers found
themselves in sudden and desperate fights, and the military for hours
failed to take actions that could have prevented many of the hostages
from being taken. There is a moral obligation owed to these Israelis,
the argument goes, and if it is not fulfilled, the covenant between the
state, the military and the public will be irrevocably shattered.10: A
new language and moral equation has emerged in the current hostage
crisis-The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, and the hostage movement
as a whole, has demanded that Israel’s absolute priority be bringing
every hostage home. #Untilthelasthostage, says the slogan printed on
their posters.The straightforward goal of bringing every hostage home,
one would hope, is accepted by all without question.But the call in this
case is more specific. It is an insistence that the government make
whatever concessions are necessary to get every last captive, living and
dead, back from Gaza.It’s a morally reasonable position.It was absent,
however, for the decade before October 7, during which the bodies of two
IDF soldiers and two living civilians were held by Hamas in Gaza. By
the standards established since the Hamas invasion, there should have
been mass protests for years demanding the government free prisoners and
grant other concessions to Hamas in order to get every last hostage
home.When the family of Hadar Goldin led a march in 2022 to mark eight
years since his body was taken by Hamas, while calling for the release
of the body of Oron Shaul and of living civilians Avera Mengistu and
Hisham al-Sayed, they were joined by only hundreds of Israelis, not tens
of thousandsSuccessive Netanyahu governments, along with the Naftali
Bennett-Yair Lapid government, did not treat the issue as a priority,
and the public followed suit.The current crisis has also seen captives
slain in Gaza being referred to as hostages. The reasoning is clear — to
stress the value of bringing bodies home for proper burial in Israel,
even if it means paying a painful price.But that’s not the terminology
that was used before October 7. Hostages referred to the living. News
outlets, including this one, spoke of Hamas holding “two hostages” until
October 7, in addition to the bodies of the two IDF soldiers.Now
Israeli leaders and journalists speak about 56 hostages, of whom 20 are
still living.It may be that the October 7 attacks were so unprecedented
that it has changed the way Israelis think about hostages, living or
dead.There is also an undeniably political aspect to the protests. Some
percentage of the demonstrators — it is impossible to say how large — is
firmly in favor of a full hostage deal that ends the war because it has
been anti-Netanyahu since long before the war.At the same time, the
language being used risks obscuring a difficult conversation that must
be had: How much should Israel give up for the return of bodies? Calling
them hostages indicates that the price should be nearly identical to
living hostages. That is the choice Israel made in the Tannenbaum
deal.Is it what Israel should be doing now? That question has pressing
real-world consequences, and obscuring the urgent need for an answer is
ultimately not in the country’s best interest.***Israel is facing a
barbaric enemy, which had the better part of two decades to prepare for a
war in which it put its own people in harm’s way by design. Israel’s
war aims are just and reasonable.But 20 months after October 7, Israel
has achieved none of its goals. It has performed countless impressive
feats on the battlefield and even on the diplomatic front. Without the
right leader and strategy, however, those successes don’t add up to
victory.Victory is still attainable. The longer Israel continues to
avoid being decisive, the more likely it is that victory will slip out
of reach.
In an Israeli first, researchers snap pix of 3
generations of dolphins off Tel Aviv coast-‘It’s rare’ to document
dolphin families together, says University of Haifa researcher; 396
documented bottlenose dolphins live along Israeli coastline-By Diana
Bletter-Today, 2:19 pm-JUN 5,25
For the first time in Israel,
researchers captured images of three generations of bottlenose dolphins
swimming together off the coast of Tel Aviv on Sunday.The “grandmother”
dolphin, known as Hooks, was photographed with her daughter and her
daughter’s calf.Meytal Markovich, a volunteer of the environmental
nonprofit Delphis Association and a University of Haifa student, took
the photographs of the three dolphins. She then showed the pictures to
Kim Kobo, 32, a researcher at the Maurice Kahn Marine Research Station
at the Czerny School of Marine Sciences at the University of Haifa.Kobo
said she was “very excited” when she recognized Hooks and her daughter
from the scars on their dorsal fins.“We know that female dolphins help
one another with their calves, but it is very rare to see the
generations all together,” Kobo told The Times of Israel.The population
of bottlenose dolphins inhabits the entire coastline of Israel, and they
are mainly observed between bottom depths of 30-60 meters (100-200
ft).Dr. Aviad Sheinin, director of the Delphis Dolphin and Sea Center
and head of the Apex Marine Predator Lab at the University of Haifa’s
marine research center, has led a long-term study to monitor dolphin
populations off the coast of Israel for the past 25 years.The team of
researchers has been collecting data on dolphins since 2005. Researchers
have documented 396 dolphins in a long-range study.Photographs of the
dolphins, with their nicknames, appear on the research station’s
website.Local dolphins are relatively small, and their diet is mainly
composed of fish. They are not considered to be in danger of
extinction.Many of the marine surveys are done with researchers from the
university in conjunction with Delphis volunteers who have undergone
special training as marine surveyors.
