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IDF Thwarts Hezbollah Strike on Mossad HQ in Central Israel
Israel’s Iron Dome anti-missile defense system intercepts rockets fired from Lebanon, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, as seen from northern Israel, Sept. 25, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Avi Ohayon
JNS.org — The Israel Defense Forces early on Wednesday intercepted a surface-to-surface ballistic missile fired by Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon at central Israel. The Iranian proxy claimed that the target of the attack was the headquarters of Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency.
Sirens were activated across the Gush Dan and Sharon regions, including in Tel Aviv, amid the intensifying conflict with the Iranian terror proxy.
The Magen David Adom emergency service said it had not received any reports of injuries in the attack.
The projectile was reportedly downed by the David’s Sling system, which supplements the defense provided by the Iron Dome, Arrow 2 and Arrow 3.
David’s Sling can intercept “large-caliber rockets, short-range ballistic missiles, and other developing threats,” according to the Israeli Air Force.
Footage circulating on social media appeared to show the interception above the Tel Aviv area.
The IDF Home Front Command said there was no change in directives for residents of central Israel, and that schools would open as usual.
Shortly after, the Israeli Air Force struck the launcher from which the missile was fired in the area of Nafakhiyeh, located some 12 miles to the east of Tyre in Lebanon.
Hezbollah took responsibility for the launch, claiming the target of the attack was the headquarters of the Mossad. “The location is responsible for the explosion of beepers and communication devices and the elimination of senior officials,” the group said.
Hezbollah blames Jerusalem for last week’s series of deadly pager and walkie-talkie explosions across Lebanon that killed dozens of terrorists and wounded thousands more.
On Monday afternoon, a Hezbollah terror rocket hit near the Israeli city of Ariel in central Samaria.
“Following the alerts that were activated at 5:12 pm in the Samaria area, approximately 10 launches were detected that crossed from the territory of Lebanon [into Israel], and falls were detected in an open area,” the IDF confirmed.
The rocket struck just outside a pre-military academy in Peduel, located east of the security barrier in northern Samaria and less than 10 miles from Israel’s central region.
Damage was also caused to houses in the Palestinian village of Deir Istiya, Israel’s Army Radio reported.
On Sept. 15, Israeli air defenses intercepted fragments of a surface-to-surface missile launched from Yemen that exploded over central Israel.
Last month, Hamas fired two rockets from Gaza at Tel Aviv, in the Palestinian terror group’s first such attack since May. One rocket landed in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of central Israel, and the other fell short inside the Strip, according to the IDF.
In July, a Houthi drone killed a man in Tel Aviv, in response to which Israel struck Yemen’s Hodeidah port. The Iranian terror proxy has launched dozens of drones and missiles at Israel in support of Hamas since Oct. 7, 2023.
Meanwhile, the Israeli Air Force has struck over 1,600 Hezbollah terror targets in southern Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley since Sunday, as part of “Operation Northern Arrows.”
On Tuesday, a 25-year-old man was moderately wounded by shrapnel during a Hezbollah rocket barrage from Lebanon towards the Mount Carmel area of northern Israel.
The Iranian proxy has fired more than 8,800 rockets, missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) toward Israel since Oct. 8. The strikes have forced over 60,000 Israelis to evacuate from northern communities, severely impacting daily life in the region.
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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.
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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.
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US Mulls Giving Millions to Controversial Gaza Aid Foundation, Sources Say
Palestinians carry aid supplies which they received from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in the central Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ramadan Abed/File Photo
The State Department is weighing giving $500 million to the new foundation providing aid to war-shattered Gaza, according to two knowledgeable sources and two former US officials, a move that would involve the US more deeply in a controversial aid effort that has been beset by violence and chaos.
The sources and former US officials, all of whom requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, said that money for Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) would come from the US Agency for International Development (USAID), which is being folded into the US State Department.
The plan has met resistance from some US officials concerned with the deadly shootings of Palestinians near aid distribution sites and the competence of the GHF, the two sources said.
The GHF, which has been fiercely criticized by humanitarian organizations, including the United Nations, for an alleged lack of neutrality, began distributing aid last week amid warnings that most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is at risk of famine after an 11-week Israeli aid blockade, which was lifted on May 19 when limited deliveries were allowed to resume.
The foundation has seen senior personnel quit and had to pause handouts twice this week after crowds overwhelmed its distribution hubs.
The State Department and GHF did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Reuters has been unable to establish who is currently funding the GHF operations, which began in Gaza last week. The GHF uses private US security and logistics companies to transport aid into Gaza for distribution at so-called secure distribution sites.
On Thursday, Reuters reported that a Chicago-based private equity firm, McNally Capital, has an “economic interest” in the for-profit US contractor overseeing the logistics and security of GHF’s aid distribution hubs in the enclave.
While US President Donald Trump’s administration and Israel say they don’t finance the GHF operation, both have been pressing the United Nations and international aid groups to work with it.
The US and Israel argue that aid distributed by a long-established U.N. aid network was diverted to Hamas. Hamas has denied that.
USAID has been all but dismantled. Some 80 percent of its programs have been canceled and its staff face termination as part of President Donald Trump’s drive to align US foreign policy with his “America First” agenda.
One source with knowledge of the matter and one former senior official said the proposal to give the $500 million to GHF has been championed by acting deputy USAID Administrator Ken Jackson, who has helped oversee the agency’s dismemberment.
The source said that Israel requested the funds to underwrite GHF’s operations for 180 days.
The Israeli government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The two sources said that some US officials have concerns with the plan because of the overcrowding that has affected the aid distribution hubs run by GHF’s contractor, and violence nearby.
Those officials also want well-established non-governmental organizations experienced in running aid operations in Gaza and elsewhere to be involved in the operation if the State Department approves the funds for GHF, a position that Israel likely will oppose, the sources said.
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