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British Home Secretary Announces Ban Against ‘Antisemitic’ Hizb ut-Tahrir Organization
Supporters of Hizb ut-Tahrir at a pro-Hamas rally in London. Photo: Reuters/Martin Pope
Britain’s interior minister on Monday announced a ban on Hizb ut-Tahrir, a militant Islamist organization that has long been in the sights of the UK authorities for its violently antisemitic rhetoric and enthusiastic support of terrorist groups including Hamas.
“Hizb ut-Tahrir is an antisemitic organization that actively promotes and encourages terrorism, including praising and celebrating the appalling Oct. 7 attacks [by Hamas terrorists in Israel],” British Home Secretary James Cleverly told parliament on Monday.
“Proscribing this terrorist group will ensure that anyone who belongs to and invites support for them will face consequences. It will curb Hizb ut-Tahrir’s ability to operate as it currently does,” Cleverly said.
The banning order will come into force on Friday unless MPs decide to vote it down. Under its terms, certain offenses are punishable with up to 14 years in prison, while the group’s property and assets face seizure now that it is classified as a “terrorist” organization.
The impetus for the ban was a pro-Hamas rally which Hizb ut-Tahrir staged in London on Oct. 21, as thousands of protestors descended on the British capital to demonstrate their opposition to Israel. Antisemitic slogans and calls for jihad were on display, leading Cleverly’s predecessor as Home Secretary, Suella Braverman, to order a review of Hizb ut-Tahrir’s activities.
Previous British governments — including the administrations of former Prime Ministers Tony Blair and David Cameron — had investigated the possibility of banning Hizb ut-Tahrir but were told by government lawyers that the group had not violated any anti-terrorism legislation.
Hizb ut-Tahrir first emerged in Jordanian-occupied Jerusalem in 1952, formed by a Palestinian Muslim cleric, Muhammad Taqi al-Din al-Nabhani. Its ideology is based on an uncompromising struggle between Muslims and non-believers that places the duty of jihad — holy war — at its center and demands the submission of all non-believers to Islam.
The group’s focus on what it calls the “near enemy” — the current rulers of Arab and Islamic countries who are deemed to be corrupt — has led to it being banned in most Arab countries as well as Indonesia, the state with the world’s biggest Muslim population.
Active in more than 50 countries, Hizb ut-Tahrir launched a chapter in the UK in the early 1980s. Its current leader is Wahid Asif Shaida, who also goes by the name Abdul Wahid, a family doctor with a practice in north London.
After Shaida warmly praised Hamas during a television interview in December, the health authority where his practice is based expressed concern over his “distressing comments,” adding that it was recommending an investigation of him by the National Health Service (NHS).
In that interview, Shaida described Hamas as a “resistance organization,” praising the Oct. 7 Hamas pogrom — in which more than 1,200 Israelis and foreigners were murdered and more than 200 kidnapped amid atrocities that included rape and mutilation — as “a very welcome punch on the nose of the enemy.”
The post British Home Secretary Announces Ban Against ‘Antisemitic’ Hizb ut-Tahrir Organization first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Two of Four Israeli Soldiers Killed in Gaza Building Collapse Identified
Tom Rothstein and the late Uri Jonathan Cohen / Photo: Israeli army spokesman
i24 News – Four Israeli soldiers were killed on Friday in the collapse of a building in Khan Younis during a military operation by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
The incident occurred during an offensive by the 98th Division targeting Hamas infrastructure in northern Khan Younis, near Bani Suheila.
The fallen soldiers were identified as Staff Sergeant Tom Rotstein, 23, from Ramat Gan; Staff Sergeant Uri Yehonatan Cohen, 20, from Neve Yarok; Reserve Staff Sergeant Chen Gross, 33; and Staff Sergeant Yoav Rovor, 19. All served in the elite Yahalom combat engineering unit.
According to IDF sources, the soldiers were part of a mission to secure a Hamas compound believed to contain underground tunnels. A powerful explosive device detonated during the operation, causing the structure to partially collapse and trap the soldiers inside.
Five additional soldiers were wounded—one seriously and four moderately. They were airlifted to hospitals, while search and recovery teams from the Home Front Command worked for hours to extract the bodies from the rubble.
This latest incident brings the total number of Israeli military fatalities to eight this week alone, raising the overall death toll to 424 since the start of the ground offensive in Gaza.
Earlier this week, three soldiers from the Rotem Battalion of the Givati Brigade were killed by an improvised explosive device in the northern Gaza Strip. Reserve Staff Sergeant Alon Perkas, 27, also died during separate combat in the Shejaiya neighborhood.
The IDF continues its operations in Gaza as military and political leaders navigate the high costs of an enduring conflict with Hamas.
The post Two of Four Israeli Soldiers Killed in Gaza Building Collapse Identified first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iranian Media Claims Obtaining ‘Sensitive’ Israeli Intelligence Materials
FILE PHOTO: The atomic symbol and the Iranian flag are seen in this illustration, July 21, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
i24 News – Iranian and Iran-affiliated media claimed on Saturday that the Islamic Republic had obtained a trove of “strategic and sensitive” Israeli intelligence materials related to Israel’s nuclear facilities and defense plans.
“Iran’s intelligence apparatus has obtained a vast quantity of strategic and sensitive information and documents belonging to the Zionist regime,” Iran’s state broadcaster said, referring to Israel in the manner accepted in those Muslim or Arab states that don’t recognize its legitimacy. The statement was also relayed by the Lebanese site Al-Mayadeen, affiliated with the Iran-backed jihadists of Hezbollah.
The reports did not include any details on the documents or how Iran had obtained them.
The intelligence reportedly included “thousands of documents related to that regime’s nuclear plans and facilities,” it added.
According to the reports, “the data haul was extracted during a covert operation and included a vast volume of materials including documents, images, and videos.”
The report comes amid high tensions over Iran’s nuclear program, over which it is in talks with the US administration of President Donald Trump.
Iranian-Israeli tensions reached an all-time high since the October 7 massacre and the subsequent Gaza war, including Iranian rocket fire on Israel and Israeli aerial raids in Iran that devastated much of the regime’s air defenses.
Israel, which regards the prospect of the antisemitic mullah regime obtaining a nuclear weapon as an existential threat, has indicated it could resort to a military strike against Iran’s installations should talks fail to curb uranium enrichment.
The post Iranian Media Claims Obtaining ‘Sensitive’ Israeli Intelligence Materials first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Israel Retrieves Body of Thai Hostage from Gaza
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz looks on, amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, in Jerusalem, Nov. 7, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
The Israeli military has retrieved the body of a Thai hostage who had been held in Gaza since Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack, Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Saturday.
Nattapong Pinta’s body was held by a Palestinian terrorist group called the Mujahedeen Brigades, and was recovered from the area of Rafah in southern Gaza, Katz said. His family in Thailand has been notified.
Pinta, an agricultural worker, was abducted from Kibbutz Nir Oz, a small Israeli community near the Gaza border where a quarter of the population was killed or taken hostage during the Hamas attack that triggered the devastating war in Gaza.
Israel’s military said Pinta had been abducted alive and killed by his captors, who had also killed and taken to Gaza the bodies of two more Israeli-American hostages that were retrieved earlier this week.
There was no immediate comment from the Mujahedeen Brigades, who have previously denied killing their captives, or from Hamas. The Israeli military said the Brigades were still holding the body of another foreign national. Only 20 of the 55 remaining hostages are believed to still be alive.
The Mujahedeen Brigades also held and killed Israeli hostage Shiri Bibas and her two young sons, according to Israeli authorities. Their bodies were returned during a two-month ceasefire, which collapsed in March after the two sides could not agree on terms for extending it to a second phase.
Israel has since expanded its offensive across the Gaza Strip as US, Qatari and Egyptian-led efforts to secure another ceasefire have faltered.
US-BACKED AID GROUP HALTS DISTRIBUTIONS
The United Nations has warned that most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is at risk of famine after an 11-week Israeli blockade of the enclave, with the rate of young children suffering from acute malnutrition nearly tripling.
Aid distribution was halted on Friday after the US-and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation said overcrowding had made it unsafe to continue operations. It was unclear whether aid had resumed on Saturday.
The GHF began distributing food packages in Gaza at the end of May, overseeing a new model of aid distribution which the United Nations says is neither impartial nor neutral. It says it has provided around 9 million meals so far.
The Israeli military said on Saturday that 350 trucks of humanitarian aid belonging to U.N. and other international relief groups were transferred this week via the Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza.
The war erupted after Hamas-led terrorists took 251 hostages and killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, in the October 7, 2023 attack, Israel’s single deadliest day.
The post Israel Retrieves Body of Thai Hostage from Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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