News Digest — 7/12/24
Reservist Succumbs To Injuries From Hezbollah Drone Attack, IDF Says
The IDF reported on Friday morning (12th) that Master Sergeant (Res.) Valeri Chefonov,33, from Netanya, a vehicle officer of the 228th Brigade’s 9308th Battalion, was killed Thursday (11th) by a Hezbollah drone strike in the western Galilee . He was laid to rest at the Netanya military cemetery at 11:00 a.m. Friday (12th).
Dr. Khaled Attalla, head of the emergency medicine department at the Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya, provided an update: “The injured arrived with shrapnel wounds to his upper body, with advanced resuscitation efforts already underway in the field. Upon arrival he was taken to the trauma room, where we continued resuscitation efforts, but unfortunately, we had to pronounce his death.”
On Thursday (11th), after several minutes of continuous sirens across the upper and Western Galilee, the IDF reported that multiple drones had crossed from Lebanon and crashed in the sector, with residents reporting “numerous explosions.”
Footage from Kibbutz Kabri, near Nahariya, showed damaged vehicles and a house with a hole in its roof. Fragments of a Hezbollah drone were also found near the impact site. The terrorist organization later claimed responsibility for the drone attack in Kabri, citing it as a response to “Israeli attacks in southern Lebanon.”
The army added that air defenses successfully intercepted several aerial targets heading toward Israel from Lebanon, following the activation of sirens in the upper Galilee.
Also on Thursday (11th), IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi held a situational assessment and commanders’ meeting at the Galilee Division on the Lebanese border, along with Northern Command head Major General Ori Gordin and Galilee Division Commander Brigadier General Shai Kalper.
Later, the IDF chief visited the Lebanon border town of Metula and met with Mayor David Azulay and other representatives to discuss the current situation and the importance of the military’s relationship with local authorities and residents.
“When your enemy is struggling, do not relent, make it even harder for them. We are intensifying our efforts to dismantle more targets and to improve our chances of bringing back the hostages under favorable conditions,” Halevi said. “This is a very significant matter. The targeted killings are crucial and are causing significant difficulties for them.”
“I believe, the command, the divisions, the entire system, including the Air Force and Military Intelligence, are doing an excellent job identifying and striking. Perhaps were are doing something else well now, but it is predicated on the condition that we have strong defense here,”
Senior Hamas Member Killed, Terrorists Trapped In Blitz Raid On UNRWA Headquarters
The IDF’s Spokesperson’s Unit reported on Thursday (11th) that forces in Gaza killed Hassan Abu Kuik, Head of Operational Security in Hamas’ Internal security Forces in the Gaza Central Camps, and conducted a large raid on a UNRWA headquarters in the central part of the Strip.
Hassan was a military operative, active in Hamas’ Emergency Bureau, and led numerous terror attacks against the State of israel. In addition, the IDF eliminated the terrorist Naser Mehanna, a team commander in Hamas’ military intelligence,” the statement read.
The military added that forces raided an UNRWA headquarters in which, “Troops located large quantities of weapons including explosive drones, grenades, explosive devices, snipers, mortar shells, rockets and RPGs.”
Forces surrounded the compound with armor and conducted its raids after military intelligence indicated hundreds of Hamas terrorists and senior commanders were using the area to reorganize after troops withdrew last January.
The IDF chose an aggressive approach during the operation after reports came that Hamas was using the complex to establish new munitions manufacturing factories including the production of rockets and missiles, prompting forces to encircle the area quickly and efficiently.
Troops surrounded the compound, which serves as a displacement camp housing thousands of Gazans before creating channels for evacuating the civilians while checking their identities using technological means developed in similar previous raids – managing to detain dozens of Hamas terrorists from the area.
The military earlier identified hundreds of terrorists from Shejaiyah who had fled into the complex after troops operating in the eastern Gaza neighborhood two weeks ago aimed at dismantling six terror tunnels leading to the Israeli border.
The dismantling of the extensive underground infrastructure below UNRWA’s headquarters and the university adjacent to it prevented terrorists from escaping during the operation. However, some of them opened fire on the forces using light weapons, machine guns, and anti-tank missiles.
Over the last two days troops noticed terrorists attempting to plant explosives on roads that they thought the military would use in the operation. In response, the military utilized drones to scan the area and buildings for signs of hidden explosives.
Erdogan Say Turkey Will Not Approve NATO Attempts To Cooperate With Israel
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday (12th) it is not possible for NATO to continue its partnership with the Israeli administration.
“Until comprehensive, sustainable peace is established in Palestine, attempts at cooperation with Israel within NATO will not be approved by Turkey,” Erdogan said at a news conference at the NATO summit.
Erdogan said as well that he has instructed Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan to meet Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to start to restore relations with Syria.
Turkey will extend an invitation to Assad “any time” for possible talks to restore relations between the two neighbors, Erdogan had said on Sunday (7th).
Regarding F-16 sales to Turkey, Erdogan stated: “I talked to Mr. Biden. ‘I will solve this problem in 3-4 weeks,’” he said
In March, the US Senate defeated an effort to stop a $23 billion sale of F-16 jets and modernization kits to Turkey, allowed by President Joe Biden’s administration after Turkey approved Sweden joining the NATO alliance.
Turkey says the YPG militia is a terrorist organization closely tied to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militant group. Turkey’s Western allies list the PKK as a terrorist group, but not the YPG.
Turkey’s goal is to become a permanent member, not just an observer, of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), Erdogan also said.
The SCO is a security, political and economic club launched in 2001 by Russia and China and Central Asian states as a counterweight to Western alliances.
Gazan Parents Have Been Programmed To Accept Death As A Blessing – Cookie Schwaeber-Issan
Thousands of Gazan youth have been recruited to be trained by Hamas to shoot at the IDF, to replace the thousands of fighters who have been killed. These kids are expendable props to Hamas, serving public relations’ purposes whe photos show youth losing their lives on the battlefield as they’re pitted against Israel’s military might. All of this is predictable, given what we know about the Hamas death cult, driven by the intense hatred that they are indoctrinated from birth.
There remains no reasonable explanation as to how mothers of Gazan youth willingly send their sons out to die, often with great pride, claiming that “it is a mother’s most glorious duty for their children to kill themselves for Palestine.” The Gazan mothers and fathers are fully complicit in sending out their children to die for a cause which is rooted in hatred, terror and evil.
When you listen to an interview, where the wife of a Hamas operative says that she and her husband, as well as their children, all pray that Allah would grant them martyrdom, it makes you wonder. They have literally been programmed to accept death as a blessing. This human tragedy rivals the biblical account of parents who offered up their children to the Canaanite god Molech, a truly homicidal act. (Jerusalem Post)
Palestinian Terror Groups Replenish Their Numbers By Sending Children To Terror Camps
In nine months of war, Israel has eliminated 60% of terrorists in Gaza, 75% if those who are severely wounded are included.
In response, Hamas and Islamic Jihad are replenishing these numbers by training children to become terrorists at camps.
These “terror camps” are not new, but there is an added urgency for the few terrorists left in Gaza to seize the opportunity to recruit new blood.
As raids on schools, many of which housed terrorist infrastructure, revealed, shildren in Gaza start early learning to hate Jews and are brainwashed to encourage them to become terrorists fighters and suicide bombers.
Once they are given propaganda instead of an education, they are easily influenced to be trained to become terrorists.
The training camps for children are run mainly by Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
An IDF report described the terror training camps, “Children receive military training from a young age, both theoretical and practical.”
“The training camps teach children how to shoot guns, make their way through the tunnel system, and how to kidnap soldiers.”
From these terror camps, young Palestinians are recruited by Hamas.
Israeli intelligence has discovered that terror groups make extensive use of minors, sometimes using them as human shields.
In Hamas’ Zeytoun battalion, children are used to transport ammunition because they count on the fact that IDF troops would be hesitant to shoot at a child.
Other terror groups in Gaza hide explosives in bags of food carried by children and, by doing so, deliberately risk the children’s lives.
Hamas summer camps are designed “To advance the resistance culture and the values of jihad, standing strong, and sacrifice within the children…to contribute to the militarization of society,” according to literature Israeli intelligence discovered.
Discussing the intelligence findings, Israeli President Isaac Herzog said that at regular camps, “youngsters, kids and adolescents learn to become citizens of the free world and with liberty, with happiness, with joy, with sports – here their entire aim is to make them terrorists.”
It’s Not Jews Who Are Waging Jihad Around The World – Robert Knight
Israel’s Arab neighbors number 22 countries with a combined population of nearly half a billion people on more than 5 million square miles of land. This doesn’t include 27 other Muslim-majority nations like Pakistan and Indonesia, or even India, which has more than 170 million Muslims. Islam, the world’s fastest-growing religion, comprises more than 1.7 billion people. By contrast, Israel has 9.3 million people on 8,000 square miles and is about the size of New Jersey. Yet much of the world is insisting that it is Israel that has to give up “land for peace.”
Likewise, it isn’t militant Jews who are waging jihad around the world on Christians, Hindus and anyone else who won’t bow to Mecca. The militants have a slogan: “First the Saturday people, then the Sunday people.”
The pro-Palestinian side argues that while Arabs have occupied what is now Israel for 3,000 years, Jews are interlopers who were not really in the picture until recently. This contradicts archaeological evidence, such as a slab in Egypt from the 13th century BCE that mentions Israel, a ninth-century Canaanite slab citing King David, and the accounts of Josephus, the Roman Jewish historian. Jews lived in the land for 2,600 years before Muhammad founded Islam around 600 CE. The term “Palestine” was coined by Roman Emperor Hadrian in 135 CE from the term “Philistines,” the Jews’ ancient enemy.
Poll: 96% Of Jews In 13 EU Countries Experience Anti-Semitism Daily
A survey conducted by the European Union’s Fundamental Rights Agency of 8,000 self-identified Jews from 13 EU countries: Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Spain, and Sweden, as reported by The Times of Israel, found that 96% of respondents said they had encountered anti-Semitism in their daily lives even before the ongoing war in Gaza.
Agency director Sirpa Rautio says that Europe’s Jewish community is facing a “rising tide of anti-Semitism,” with the conflict in the Middle East “eroding” progress made in the fight against it and the surge in anti-Semitism jeopardizing the success of the EU’s first-ever strategy for combating the problem.
Some 37% of respondents said they were harassed over the past year with 4% saying they had experienced anti-Semitic physical attacks during that time, double the number recorded in 2018, the last time the agency held a survey.
Most respondents said they worry for their own (53%) and their family’s (60%) safety and security.
A vast majority of Jews (80%) said they felt anti-Semitism has worsened in recent years. The most common “stereotypes” accused Jews of “holding power and control over finance, media, politics, or economy.”
76% of respondents reported that they had hid their Jewish identity “at least occasionally,” and 34% avoided Jewish events or sites “because they do not feel safe.” 74% of Jews felt that the Gaza conflict had affected their sense of security, the highest rate among the countries surveyed.
Many reported encountering denial of Israel’s right to exist as a state and 75% felt that people hold them responsible for the Israeli government’s actions because they are Jewish.
The Fundamental Rights Agency report relying on information collected from 12 Jewish organizations in 2024, and the agency’s consultation with national and European Jewish umbrella organizations in early 2024 “shows a dramatic surge in anti-Semitic attacks,” Fundamental Right Agency director Rautio said, warning that “Jews are more frightened than ever before.”
