News Digest — 2/13/26
Netanyahu Will Not Return To Washington To Attend Board Of Peace Inaugural Meeting
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not travel to Washington next week to attend a Feb. 19 meeting of the Board of Peace, his office said, even as Israel formally signed on to the post-war governance body alongside US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“Prime Minister Netanyahu will participate in the annual AIPAC conference virtually, and, therefore, will not fly to Washington next week,” the Prime Minister’s Office said in a statement referring to the upcoming conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.
The announcement followed Israel’s decision to join the Board of Peace, an international body established to address governance and stabilization arrangements in the Gaza Strip following the war
The Charter of the Board of Peace was signed on January 22 by 19 countries on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland.
According to the framework outlined at the forum, the Board of Peace was created as part of efforts to resolve the situation in Gaza and to oversee postwar governance mechanisms.
The body is based on an agreement between Israel and the radical Palestinian movement Hamas, regarding governance in the Gaza Strip, while also being tasked with preventing and mediating conflicts in other regions.
Netanyahu’s decision not to attend the Washington meeting comes after a recent visit to the United States that was publicly described as urgent and focused on discussions over the ongoing nuclear talks between Washington and Tehran.
The timing of that visit, however, prompted speculation that the Israeli leader might not appear at the inaugural Board of Peace summit.
The US-backed initiative has drawn criticism in Israel, in part because it internationalizes Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians and provides a formal role for additional regional and international actors.
Critics have pointed to the involvement of countries such as Turkey and Qatar, which are seen in Jerusalem as rivals with connecting interests in Gaza.
Despite Netanyahu’s absence from the Washington meeting, Israeli officials emphasized that Israel’s participation in the Board of Peace reflects coordination with the United States aid and an effort to shape postwar arrangements from within the framework rather than outside it.
The government did not indicate whether Netanyahu would attend future Board of Peace meetings in person.
WJC President Joins Calls For Removal Of UN Rapporteur Albanese
World Jewish Congress (WJC) President Ronald S. Lauder on Thursday (12th) called for the removal of UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, joining a growing list of those who have called for her removal due to her constant anti-Israel statements.
In a statement ahead of his attendance at this week’s Munich Security Conference, Lauder said, “Amid growing geopolitical turbulence and disturbing rise in anti-Semitism, it is essential that world leaders stand firmly behind US President Donald Trump’s initiatives to promote stability, ensure safety of the Jewish people, and advance peace.”
“Key among these is the recent sanctioning of UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, a dangerous figure who continues to use her position to promote discredited conspiracy theories, divisive and anti-Semitic narratives, and who represents an extremist ideological agenda rather than that of the other nations,” added the WJC President.
“As I meet with leaders in Munich and in the weeks ahead, I will advocate for a clear moral line to be drawn. Individuals such as Ms. Albanese must be removed from the UN before more damage is done to the Jewish people – and the institution’s mission,” he concluded.
Later on Thursday (12th), Austria and Germany called for the resignation of Albanese following her recent remarks calling Israel the “common enemy of humanity.”
The French government previously called for Albanese to step down over the remarks. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told lawmakers that France “unreservedly condemns the outrageous and reprehensible remarks made by Ms. Francesca Albanese which are directed not at the Israeli government but at Israel as a people and as a nation, which is absolutely unacceptable.”
The calls for her removal follow remarks delivered at the Al Jazeera conference, in which Albanese had said, “The fact that instead of stopping Israel, most of the world has armed, given Israel political excuses, political sheltering, economic and financial support. … We who do not control large amounts of financial capitals, algorithms and weapons, we now see that we as a humanity have a common enemy.”
Albanese later claimed in an interview with France 24 that she “never, ever said Israel is the common enemy of humanity” calling the “accusations completely false.”
Albanese’s history of anti-Israel statements and actions is well-documented and dates back to social media posts uncovered in 2022, in which she claimed that the “Jewish Lobby” controls the United States.
At the time Albanese rejected arguments that the comments about the “Jewish Lobby” were anti-Semitic and claimed they were mischaracterized, but her anti-Israel bias has continued to be exposed since.
Her criticism of Israel has grown since Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel. The attack in which Hamas terrorists killed 1,200 people and took 251 hostages, was described by Albanese as an act that must be viewed in “context” and as a response to Israeli “aggression.”
She has also in recent months accused Israel of genocide, likened the government of Israel to the “Third Reich,” and compared Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Adolf Hitler.
Israel Navy Commandos, Submarines Train To Protect Eilat From Invasion
The IDF announced on Thursday (12th) that it held a multi-day drill to defend a potential sea invasion into Eilat.
Three major portions of the Israeli Navy – the elite Shayetet 13 Naval commandos, submarines, and missile boats – were all involved in the drill, along with the Israeli Air Force, the Operations Directorate command, and the Logistics Directorate.
Many of the scenarios that the IDF trained to defend against were prepared based on special intelligence that the IDF gained from a high-ranking Hezbollah secret naval commander it captured around 16 months ago.
At the time Shayetet 13 raided a coastal area in Batroun, south of Tripoli, around 140 km north of Israel’s maritime border with Lebanon, and captured Imad Amhaz.
The military stated that Amhaz was a central operative in Hezbollah’s highly-classified maritime program and more specifically in Unit 7900, its land-to-sea missile unit.
During interrogation, Amhaz confirmed his senior role in the clandestine Hezbollah naval activities, such as building covert operations under the guise of civilian cover to target Israeli and international interests.
To defend against invasion scenarios, the navy cooperates with other arms of the IDF to throw a massive intelligence collection envelope over all nearby maritime areas, using intelligence elements from above, from sea level and underground.
There have been concerns throughout 2023 to 2026 that Israel has been spread thin in terms of collecting intelligence on certain less-prominent threat points.
The Shayetet 13 commandos also practiced a variety of drills, such as boarding and challenging hostile attackers’ modes of transportation in complex circumstances.
Part of the drill also related to defending Israel’s sea-based natural gas rigs, which has strategic value to its energy stability.
Terrorist Groups In Gaza Change Operational Tactics
Terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip, including Hamas and Islamic Jihad, are raising alert levels and changing their operational patterns according to a report in the Saudi newspaper Assharq al-Awsat.
The report notes that following a series of targeted assassinations in recent weeks, carried out against commanders and senior terrorists, in the field, the military leadership of these terrorist organizations has instructed their field units to adopt stricter measures similar to those used during previous wars.
According to sources in Gaza, the new instructions include prolonged hiding, reducing the use of technology and mobile phones to avoid detection by Artificial Intelligence technology used by Israel.
Sources in Gaza pointed out that terrorists have been instructed to avoid using communication devices and to hide for days or weeks in isolated locations to prevent exposure and detection.
Hamas And Fatah: Different Paths, Same Destination – Sagiv Steinberg
In January 2026, Rawhi Fattouh, chairman of the Palestinian National Council, presented an honorary shield to the outgoing Chinese ambassador to the Palestinian Authority. On the shield appeared a map of a single “Palestine” encompassing all of the State of Israel, alongside an embroidered “key of return” – the symbol of the demand for millions of Palestinians to return to cities and towns within sovereign Israel. Above the map, a single word was written in English: Palestine.
The incident was a consistent expression of official Palestinian ideology. Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the Palestinian Authority and head of the Fatah faction, wears a key pin on his suit. The official Fatah website says: “Final victory will not be achieved until the flag of Palestine flies over the minarets, churches, and walls of Jerusalem… and the return of the refugees.” The emblem of Fatah displays a map of “complete Palestine” without any trace of the State of Israel, and two crossed rifles above it.
Both the Hamas charter and the Fatah website share the same strategic goal: complete liberation of “historic Palestine,” establishment of one state from the river to the sea, Jerusalem as the capital, and an absolute refusal to recognize the legitimacy of any Jewish state. For both, the 1967 lines are but a temporary formula – a stage on the path to the final goal.
One of the most painful lessons from the October 7 attack is the need to listen to what the enemy says in its own voice, not through interpretation with Western glasses. The term “two states for two peoples” is a Western-Israeli invention. It has never been stated by an official Palestinian leader. The Palestinian national movement, in all its shades, has one clear goal: the end of the State of Israel. It is time we look truth in the eye.
The writer is CEO and director of communications at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs.
Why I’m Optimistic About The Jewish Future – Natan Sharansky Interviewed By Mathilda Heller
“Jewish children have to be reminded how much strength the Jewish people have; you will not find anything like the story of the Jewish people,” Natan Sharansky, who served 9 years in a Soviet prison, told The Jerusalem Post on Monday (9th). “After the Six-Day War, when Jews in the Soviet Union began to connect to Israel and learn about their identity, they discovered that there is a great history that they wanted to be a part of. There are great people, there is a great country. Then, there suddenly appear values in your life which are bigger than survival, than political career, professional career, and then you have enough strength to say publicly that you want to go to Israel, that you want to be Jewish.”
While working as Israel’s Interior Minister, he realized that the “Free World” was not as free as he thought. “In 2003, I made my trip as a minister of Israel to certain different universities; it was the time of the Second Intifada. I discovered that there are more and more Jews in the best universities in America – at Harvard, Columbia, in Berkeley – who want very much to express their solidarity with Israel, but they are afraid that it will condemn their careers.”
Sharansky then wrote an article published in Maariv called “Traveling To Occupied Territory,” referring to the American universities. This is “the most important battle for the future of the Jewish people, because our survival depends on whether we have a proud, strong Jewish identity. I believe that our history, our very tragic history, is very optimistic. You will not find anything like this. Not in terms of survival of a people, not in terms of rebuilding after thousands of years and gathering in exiles and rebuilding the state. So yes, I am optimistic.”
