News Digest — 8/15/25
IDF Announces Death Of Hamas Terrorist Nasser Musa In Khan Yunis
Security forces, led by the Southern Command, struck and killed Nasser Musa, a key operative in Hamas’ Rafah Brigade, in the Khan Kunis area on August 9, 2025, the IDF said Friday (15th).
Musa served as head of Hamas’ military control department and was responsible for the readiness and training of operatives in the brigades, who planned and carried out terror activity against IDF forces and Israeli civilians during the war, the IDF and Shin Bet said in a joint statement.
He was a close associate of Muhammed Shabana, the Rafah Brigade commander who was killed in May 2025. He previously held multiple roles in the Rafah Brigade, including military intelligence officer and head of the observation network.
His elimination further damages the Rafah Brigade and Hamas’ ability to carry out terror activity against IDF troops in the area, the military said.
Israel Air Force fighter jets struck a building in Khan Yunis used by terror organizations to store rockets intended for launch toward Israel and IDF troops, on Thursday (14th).
National Security Minister Ben-Gvir Warns Marwan Barghouti In Prison
National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir spoke with Marwan Barghouti in prison on Thursday (14th) and warned, “Whoever messes with Israel – we will wipe him out.”
“You will not defeat us, whoever messes with the people of Israel, whoever murders our children and women – we will wipe him out,” ben-Gvir told him. “You need to know this, it’s been like this throughout history.”
The Palestinian Authority released a complaint following Ben Gvir’s comments, claiming that his comments constituted “state terrorism.”
“The Palestinian Authority’s Foreign Ministry condemns the visit on the cell of commander Marwan Barghouti by extremist Israeli Minister Ben-Gvir, directly threatening him. This is provocation and organized state terrorism,” the statement read.
Barghouti was sentenced in 2004 to five life sentences for his role in orchestrating attacks that killed many Israelis.
He helped establish Tanzim, the military faction of Fatah, in the 1980s.
Barghouti, often referred to as the “Palestinian Mandela,” has long been considered a unifying figure among Palestinians, according to The Media Line.
Reports have indicated that Hamas demanded the release of Barghouti throughout the ceasefire-hostage deal negotiations, hoping that such a move would reignite support for Hamas.
Israel Gives ‘Collaborators’ Tortured By Ramallah $29 Million In PA Funds
Israel has transferred $29 million in frozen Palestinian Authority tax revenues to 52 Palestinians who were arrested and tortured by the PA for assisting Israeli security forces in preventing terrorist attacks, Hebrew media reported on Tuesday (12th).
The transfer of the funds marked the conclusion of a legal battle led by the Arbus, Kedem, Tzur Law Firm, which has represented the Palestinian victims, as well as Israeli terror victims, in Jerusalem District Court proceedings.
“This is a dramatic step by the State of Israel,” attorneys Barak Kedem and Aryeh Arbus told Israel National News, noting that “even today, dozens of Palestinians come to our office who were tortured by Abu Mazen’s PA, solely because they helped Israel prevent terrorism,” referring to PA leader Mahmoud Abbas.
“It’s important that everyone out there who helps Israel in various ways knows that, when the time comes, Israel will assist them,” they added.
A spokesman for Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich told JNS on Tuesday (12th) that every court decision requiring the PA to pay damages to terror victims or to Palestinians persecuted for aiding Israel is now executed promptly, with funds deducted from Ramallah’s tax revenues.
Jerusalem collects $162 million to $189 million in tax and tariff revenue on behalf of Ramallah every month under the terms of the Oslo Accords, signed in the 1990s.
“For years the Palestinian Authority encouraged terror without paying a price. No more,” Smotrich’s spokesman said, adding that verdicts totaling billions of shekels have been enforced to date.
The lawsuits were based on a precedent-setting Supreme Court ruling from 2021, which determined that Israeli courts are authorized to hear claims against the PA, which it said does not enjoy state immunity.
Medical files submitted in the various lawsuits proved PA officers beat their victims all over their bodies with rifles, batons and electric cables.
They were denied sleep and access to a toilet, forced to drink liquid soap and had teeth broken. Family members were also threatened.
Judge Miriam Ilany ruled in December that Ramallah “is responsible for the unlawful imprisonment and torture of the cooperators,” adding that the conduct “constitutes a blatant violation of basic human rights.”
“It is hard to realize that the Israeli courts would recognize a defense that cooperation with Israel is an act of treason in favor of the Israeli enemy,” she said.
”In addition, those acts of ‘treason’ were intended to prevent acts of terrorism against Israel and against Israelis, which the PA pledged to prevent in the Oslo Accords interim agreement.”
Under the terms of the Oslo Accords, which the Jewish state signed with Palestinian terror leader Yasser Arafat in the 1990s, the newly created PA was tasked with fighting terrorism in parts of Judea and Samaria.
The PA has one of the largest per capita security forces in the world, trained and armed by the United States and other Western nations.
Some countries want the PA to assume control of Gaza after the war against Hamas ends, a move that Jerusalem has so far resisted.
Heat Wave: IDF Distributes Hundreds Of Air Conditioning Kits To Soldiers
Amid the extreme heat wave, the IDF has made widespread adjustments to maintain the soldiers’ safety. Due to the high heat index, the Ground Forces Command ordered the reduction of training and adjustments needed for ongoing activities.
The IDF Technology and Logistics Directorate is making comprehensive preparations to provide a full operational response, including reinforcing IDF bases with electricians and dedicated maintenance teams to handle malfunctions. The head of the directorate has established a special task force to manage the preparations. In the event of a fire, forces are equipped with water tanks and fire retardant materials, ensuring readiness to respond quickly and effectively.
At the Sayerim Base, where several soldiers have fainted due to the heat, soldiers were sent home early. Approximately 100 air conditioning units were installed at Sayarim. Also in the bases in the Jordan Valley, every room is equipped with an air conditioner.
In the Southern Command, 498 air conditioning kits were distributed, mainly for closed tents, and 503 kits that include a generator, an air conditioner, and appropriate wires were distributed to troops in the Gaza Strip.
‘Israeli Military Action Saved Us,’ Says Druze Massacre Survivor
A Syrian Druze woman who survived the Sweida massacre says the Israel Defense Forces saved her family and community from complete annihilation.
The Druze woman who survived a jihadist assault on her community in Syria has publicly praised the Israeli army, crediting the Jewish state with saving her life and the lives of her family members.
The Druze – an ethnic and religious minority concentrated in Syria, Lebanon, and Israel – suffered a horrific Islamically-motivated attack in July 2025 in the southern Syrian city of Sweida.
According to witnesses and reports, jihadist forces stormed the city, committing mass atrocities, including rape and murder of infants and the elderly.
At least 1,000 Druze civilians are believed to have been killed in the massacre.
Israel intervened militarily to halt the bloodshed, bombing jihadist forces near Sweida and striking both military and government-linked targets in Damascus.
The Jewish state has provided humanitarian aid to survivors.
Speaking on the Israeli Arabic-language radio program, Voice of the Druze, a woman identifying herself as Rama Rida said her people would have been “completely destroyed” without the intervention of the IDF.
“If there had been no direct Israeli military intervention, the Druze people in Syria would have been destroyed,” Rida said.
She pushed back against accusations from the Arab world that Druze who express gratitude toward Israel are traitors.
“When they come to murder me, my husband and my children – when they come to murder and ethnically cleanse my people – what do you expect me to do? Stand by and do nothing? No, I will turn to Israel and ask it to help me,” Rida added.
“I am proud of that, and I am not afraid to say so. No Arab country can take any step without Israeli consent, so now you accuse me of treason because I support Israeli intervention that prevented the destruction of my people?”
Videos circulating on social media prove that the killing of Druze in Syria is ongoing, including footage showing Syrian soldiers murdering a Druze man in a local hospital.
In July, Israeli Druze leader Sheikh Mowafaq Tarif told Hebrew-language i24 News that the “jihadist majority” is currently “in charge of Syria.”
Tarif added that the attacks on the Druze in Syria are reminiscent of the Holocaust and October 7th.
Hamas Livestreamed Its Massacre To The World – That’s Public Domain – Sarah Tuttle-Singer
When Hamas terrorists stormed into Israel on October 7, murdering more than 1,200 people in a single day, they filmed these atrocities as they committed them and livestreamed their footage to the world. Less than two years later – while hostages are still rotting in terror tunnels – the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) decided this story is too risky to show because the filmmakers did not obtain permission from the perpetrators of the massacre.
Let that sink in! A major international film festival is effectively saying: unless the murderers sign a waiver, the massacre cannot be seen. As comedian Benji Lovitt put it, “Imagine the Nuremberg Trials refusing Nazi footage because they didn’t get Goebbels to sign a waiver. The Allied Forces at the Nuremberg Trials used the footage as evidence because the world needed to see the truth.
Film festivals have shown films that use footage from Nazis, from ISIS, from warlords and death squads across the globe. No one demanded copyright clearance from Osama bin Laden’s estate. So why now? The answer is obvious: Jewish suffering has become politically inconvenient. Jews are the “wrong” kind of victims.
This is not about clearance. This is about fear. Fear of protests, fear of disruption, fear of the headlines that might follow. And fear that folks will also have to reckon with Jewish trauma and suffering. The survivors of October 7 do not need TIFF to validate their truth. But the world does need to see what happened – unvarnished, unblurred, unedited, by the sensitivities of the comfortable.
The Futility Of Compassion For Those Who Want To Kill You – Jonathan S. Tobin
The notion that the Gaza conflict is only between Israel and Hamas, and not the Palestinian people, is mistaken. Many of those who crossed the border between Gaza and Israel on October 7 and took part in the orgy of mass murder, rape, torture, kidnapping, and wanton destruction, were ordinary Arab civilians. Palestinian civilians not only supported Hamas but cheered on the terrible deeds done in their name.
Almost all of the freed Israeli hostages reported that their captors, who abused, starved and tortured them, were ordinary people and not just armed cadres. Not a single Palestinian civilian helped an Israeli escape, not even to collect the $5 million reward that Israel offered for information as to their whereabouts.
As has long been apparent to those willing to see beyond their idealistic projection of good feelings onto those who hate Israel, the conflict is not just carried on by a few terrorists but by the Palestinian people as a whole. Sadly, their national identity is inextricably tied to the century-old war on the Jewish presence in this tiny country. That is why their leaders have rejected peace offers involving an independent Palestinian state, going back to 1947.
The world now knows that Hamas and the Palestinians cannot be bought off with money or food. Their cause is not the struggle for a better life but to destroy Israel. And, as they’ve demonstrated in the last 22 months, they are willing to sacrifice as many of their own people on the altar of that cause as necessary.
Compassion, even for one’s enemies, may seem high-minded. And, of course, we deplore all the deaths and the suffering that war has brought to both sides. However, when compassion is applied to those who wish you dead, it becomes an incentive for hate, not an act of kindness.
(jns.org)
