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Hezbollah Launched 25 Attacks From Near UNIFIL Posts Over Past Month

UN peacekeepers (UNIFIL) vehicles drive in Marjayoun, near the border with Israel, amid ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, southern Lebanon, Oct. 11, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Karamallah Daher

JNS.org — Over the past month, the Lebanese terror group Hezbollah has fired 25 rockets and missiles at Israeli communities and forces from terrorist compounds embedded near United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) posts in southern Lebanon, the IDF said on Sunday night.

One of the attacks killed two Israeli soldiers.

The IDF accused the Iranian-backed terror army of “exploiting their proximity to UN forces.”

During a targeted ground raid in southern Lebanon, troops from the 146th Division located hundreds of weapons, including firearms, grenades and rocket launchers aimed at Israeli territory. These weapons were stored in compounds located from a few dozen meters up to a few hundred meters from UNIFIL posts situated near the Blue Line border.

“UNIFIL in southern Lebanon was deployed to implement UN Security Council Resolution 1701 and prevent the presence of armed Hezbollah operatives south of the Litani River. However, both the State of Lebanon and the international community have failed to implement Resolution 1701, despite repeated requests to do so,” the IDF said.

“For years, Hezbollah has embedded itself in southern Lebanon in grave violation of UN Security Council resolutions. The organization has stockpiled large quantities of weapons aimed at Israeli civilians over the years and has deliberately built up its attack infrastructure near UNIFIL posts,” the military continued.

The IDF emphasized that its raids target only Hezbollah and not UNIFIL posts, forces or infrastructure, noting that on Sept. 30, before the start of ground operations in Lebanon, IDF representatives requested that UNIFIL move its personnel away from posts located within five kilometers of the Blue Line because this area would become an active combat zone.

However, the United Nations has refused to move its forces to safer areas, despite a plea from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday.

“I want to directly address the UN secretary-general from here: It is time for you to remove UNIFIL from Hezbollah’s strongholds and from the combat areas,” the premier said in a statement.

“The IDF has repeatedly requested this, only to be met with refusal, a refusal aimed solely at providing Hezbollah terrorists with a human shield. Your refusal to evacuate UNIFIL soldiers turns them into hostages of Hezbollah. This endangers both them and the lives of our soldiers,” he continued.

“We regret the harm caused to UNIFIL soldiers, and we are doing everything we can to prevent it. But the simplest and most obvious way to ensure their safety is to simply remove them from the danger zone. Mr. Secretary-General, get the UNIFIL forces out of harm’s way. It should be done right now, immediately,” Netanyahu said.

“Unfortunately, some European leaders are applying pressure in the wrong place. Instead of criticizing Israel, they should direct their criticism at Hezbollah, which uses UNIFIL as a human shield, just as Hamas in Gaza uses UNRWA as a human shield. Unfortunately, in Gaza, UNRWA even collaborates with Hamas,” he added.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres was defiant on Sunday, saying that any attacks on peacekeepers “may constitute a war crime.”

“UNIFIL peacekeepers remain in all positions and the UN flag continues to fly,” UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said in a statement.

For its part, the Israeli army said that “the IDF maintains continuous communication with UNIFIL to avoid, as much as possible, any harm to UNIFIL personnel in the area and will continue to do so, despite the complexities of the UNIFIL’s presence inside the combat zone.”

Gallant: Hezbollah will not be allowed to return to border

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on Sunday that Hezbollah will not be allowed to return to the Lebanese border area.

“The first line of villages contains Hezbollah military targets, where thousands of weapons and missiles are stored, and where there are hundreds of tunnels. These [military targets] will be destroyed, and even once IDF troops withdraw, we will not allow Hezbollah terrorists to return to these areas,” Gallant said during a visit to an observation post overlooking southern Lebanon.

Israeli soldiers entered southern Lebanon at the end of September, weeks after the Security Cabinet added the safe return of tens of thousands of internally displaced residents to their homes in the north to Israel’s official war goals.

Gallant conducted a tour and operational briefing with the commander of the IDF’s 91st Division and received an overview of the division’s activities, “with an emphasis on the progress made in ground operations aimed at locating and eliminating Hezbollah’s attack infrastructure in southern Lebanon,” according to his office.

“At this observation post we can see the entire first line of villages with Hezbollah infrastructure. These are military targets containing underground tunnels and weapon storages — our troops found hundreds of RPGs, munition and anti-tank missiles here. The IDF is currently destroying these means above and under the ground,” Gallant said.

“I have instructed the IDF at all levels to ensure the destruction of [attack infrastructure] and to ensure that terrorists may not return to these places. This is essential in order to ensure the safety of Israel’s northern communities.”

“The IDF’s actions are powerful and effective — we are operating in the entire area. We have destroyed [attack] infrastructure in Beirut, in the Bekaa [Valley] and across Lebanon, and now we are operating along the border. We will continue until operational requirements are achieved.”

Over 100 terrorists killed

The IDF said on Sunday night forces from its 146th Division have killed over 100 terrorists to date in targeted raids and ground operations in southern Lebanon.

Additionally, the division’s forces have located and destroyed dozens of tunnel shafts, terrorist infrastructure and over 50 rocket launchers and over 60 Hezbollah command posts.

Also, forces from the 205th Brigade uncovered terror infrastructure located in a tunnel around half a kilometer from the Israeli border. The tunnel contained equipment used by terrorists for prolonged stays, including electrical infrastructure, ventilation ducts and two rooms used for storing weapons and ammunition.

The tunnel itself was discovered several months ago and has now been destroyed.

Reports Beirut attacks halted ‘entirely false’

An Israeli official on Sunday night denied Hebrew media reports that Israel’’ political echelon had directed the IDF to pause airstrikes against Hezbollah targets in Beirut in the past three days.

The reports are “entirely false,” the source told the Times of Israel, adding that “Israel maintains freedom of action all across Lebanon, depending on the location of the targets.”

Ynet had reported that US President Joe Biden asked Netanyahu to curb strikes in the Lebanese capital when the two spoke last week.

Hezbollah airs audio recording of Nasrallah

Hezbollah on Sunday aired an audio recording of Hassan Nasrallah, just over two weeks after an Israeli strike killed the leader of the terror group in the Dahiyah district south of Beirut.

“We count on you … to defend your people, your families, your nation, your values and your dignity, and to defend this holy and blessed land and this honorable people,” Nasrallah is heard saying in the recording.

Hezbollah said that the recording was made as he addressed the Iran-backed terror group’s fighters during a military maneuver.

Israeli strike kills Radwan missile unit commander

The IDF announced on Monday afternoon that the commander of Hezbollah’s Radwan Force’’ anti-tank missile unit was killed in an airstrike in the area of Nabatieh in southern Lebanon.

According to the Israeli military, Muhammad Kamel Naeem was responsible for planning and carrying out many terrorist attacks, including anti-tank missile attacks against Israeli civilians.

The post Hezbollah Launched 25 Attacks From Near UNIFIL Posts Over Past Month first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Syria’s Sharaa Says Talks With Israel Could Yield Results ‘In Coming Days’

Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa speaks at the opening ceremony of the 62nd Damascus International Fair, the first edition held since the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, in Damascus, Syria, Aug. 27, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi

Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa said on Wednesday that ongoing negotiations with Israel to reach a security pact could lead to results “in the coming days.”

He told reporters in Damascus the security pact was a “necessity” and that it would need to respect Syria’s airspace and territorial unity and be monitored by the United Nations.

Syria and Israel are in talks to reach an agreement that Damascus hopes will secure a halt to Israeli airstrikes and the withdrawal of Israeli troops who have pushed into southern Syria.

Reuters reported this week that Washington was pressuring Syria to reach a deal before world leaders gather next week for the UN General Assembly in New York.

But Sharaa, in a briefing with journalists including Reuters ahead of his expected trip to New York to attend the meeting, denied the US was putting any pressure on Syria and said instead that it was playing a mediating role.

He said Israel had carried out more than 1,000 strikes on Syria and conducted more than 400 ground incursions since Dec. 8, when the rebel offensive he led toppled former Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad.

Sharaa said Israel’s actions were contradicting the stated American policy of a stable and unified Syria, which he said was “very dangerous.”

He said Damascus was seeking a deal similar to a 1974 disengagement agreement between Israel and Syria that created a demilitarized zone between the two countries.

He said Syria sought the withdrawal of Israeli troops but that Israel wanted to remain at strategic locations it seized after Dec. 8, including Mount Hermon. Israeli ministers have publicly said Israel intends to keep control of the sites.

He said if the security pact succeeds, other agreements could be reached. He did not provide details, but said a peace agreement or normalization deal like the US-mediated Abraham Accords, under which several Muslim-majority countries agreed to normalize diplomatic ties with Israel, was not currently on the table.

He also said it was too early to discuss the fate of the Golan Heights because it was “a big deal.”

Reuters reported this week that Israel had ruled out handing back the zone, which Donald Trump unilaterally recognized as Israeli during his first term as US president.

“It’s a difficult case – you have negotiations between a Damascene and a Jew,” Sharaa told reporters, smiling.

SECURITY PACT DERAILED IN JULY

Sharaa also said Syria and Israel had been just “four to five days” away from reaching the basis of a security pact in July, but that developments in the southern province of Sweida had derailed those discussions.

Syrian troops were deployed to Sweida in July to quell fighting between Druze armed factions and Bedouin fighters. But the violence worsened, with Syrian forces accused of execution-style killings and Israel striking southern Syria, the defense ministry in Damascus and near the presidential palace.

Sharaa on Wednesday described the strikes near the presidential palace as “not a message, but a declaration of war,” and said Syria had still refrained from responding militarily to preserve the negotiations.

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Anti-Israel Activists Gear Up to ‘Flood’ UN General Assembly

US Capitol Police and NYPD officers clash with anti-Israel demonstrators, on the day Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses a joint meeting of Congress, on Capitol Hill, in Washington, DC, July 24, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Umit Bektas

Anti-Israel groups are planning a wave of raucous protests in New York City during the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) over the next several days, prompting concerns that the demonstrations could descend into antisemitic rhetoric and intimidation.

A coalition of anti-Israel activists is organizing the protests in and around UN headquarters to coincide with speeches from Middle Eastern leaders and appearances by US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The demonstrations are expected to draw large crowds and feature prominent pro-Palestinian voices, some of whom have been criticized for trafficking in antisemitic tropes, in addition to calling for the destruction of Israe.

Organizers of the demonstrations have promoted the coordinated events on social media as an opportunity to pressure world leaders to hold Israel accountable for its military campaign against Hamas in Gaza, with some messaging framed in sharply hostile terms.

On Sunday, for example, activists shouted at Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon.

“Zionism is terrorism. All you guys are terrorists committing ethnic cleansing and genocide in Gaza and Palestine. Shame on you, Zionist animals,” they shouted.

The Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM), warned on its website that the scale and tone of the planned demonstrations risk crossing the line from political protest into hate speech, arguing that anti-Israel activists are attempting to hijack the UN gathering to spread antisemitism and delegitimize the Jewish state’s right to exist.

Outside the UN last week, masked protesters belonging to the activist group INDECLINE kicked a realistic replica of Netanyahu’s decapitated head as though it were a soccer ball.

Within Our Lifetime (WOL), a radical anti-Israel activist group, has vowed to “flood” the UNGA on behalf of the pro-Palestine movement.

WOL, one of the most prolific anti-Israel activist groups, came under immense fire after it organized a protest against an exhibition to honor the victims of the Oct. 7 massacre at the Nova Music Festival in southern Israel. During the event, the group chanted “resistance is justified when people are occupied!” and “Israel, go to hell!”

“We will be there to confront them with the truth: Their silence and inaction enable genocide. The world cannot continue as if Gaza does not exist,” WOL said of its planned demonstrations in New York. “This is the time to make our voices impossible to ignore. Come to New York by any means necessary, to stand, to march, to demand the UN act and end the siege.”

Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM), two other anti-Israel organizations that have helped organize widespread demonstrations against the Jewish state during the war in Gaza, also announced they are planning a march from Times Square to the UN headquarters on Friday.

“The time is now for each and every UN member state to uphold their duty under international law: sanction Israel and end the genocide,” the groups said in a statement.

JVP, an organization that purports to fight for “Palestinian liberation,” has positioned itself as a staunch adversary of the Jewish state. The group argued in a 2021 booklet that Jews should not write Hebrew liturgy because hearing the language would be “deeply traumatizing” to Palestinians. JVP has repeatedly defended the Oct. 7 massacre of roughly 1,200 people in southern Israel by Hamas as a justified “resistance.” Chapters of the organization have urged other self-described “progressives” to throw their support behind Hamas and other terrorist groups against Israel

Similarly, PYM, another radical anti-Israel group, has repeatedly defended terrorism and violence against the Jewish state. PYM has organized many anti-Israel protests in the two years following the Oct. 7 attacks in the Jewish state. Recently, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK) called for a federal investigation into the organization after Aisha Nizar, one of the group’s leaders, urged supporters to sabotage the US supply chain for the F-35 fighter jet, one of the most advanced US military assets and a critical component of Israel’s defense.

The UN General Assembly has historically been a flashpoint for heated debate over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Previous gatherings have seen dueling demonstrations outside the Manhattan venue, with pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian groups both seeking to influence the international spotlight.

While warning about the demonstrations, CAM noted it recently launched a new mobile app, Report It, that allows users worldwide to quickly and securely report antisemitic incidents in real time.

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Nina Davidson Presses Universities to Back Words With Action as Jewish Students Return to Campus Amid Antisemitism Crisis

Nina Davidson on The Algemeiner’s ‘J100’ podcast. Photo: Screenshot

Philanthropist Nina Davidson, who served on the board of Barnard College, has called on universities to pair tough rhetoric on combatting antisemitism with enforcement as Jewish students returned to campuses for the new academic year.

“Years ago, The Algemeiner had published a list ranking the most antisemitic colleges in the country. And number one was Columbia,” Davidson recalled on a recent episode of The Algemeiner‘s “J100” podcast. “As a board member and as someone who was representing the institution, it really upset me … At the board meeting, I brought it up and I said, ‘What are we going to do about this?’”

Host David Cohen, chief executive officer of The Algemeiner, explained he had revisited Davidson’s remarks while she was being honored for her work at The Algemeiner‘s 8th annual J100 gala, held in October 2021, noting their continued relevance.

“It could have been the same speech in 2025,” he said, underscoring how longstanding concerns about campus antisemitism, while having intensified in the aftermath of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, are not new.

Davidson argued that universities already possess the tools to protect students – codes of conduct, time-place-manner rules, and consequences for threats or targeted harassment – but too often fail to apply them evenly. “Statements are not enough,” she said, arguing that institutions need to enforce their rules and set a precedent that there will be consequences for individuals who refuse to follow them.

She also said that stakeholders – alumni, parents, and donors – are reassessing their relationships with schools that, in their view, have not safeguarded Jewish students. While supportive of open debate, Davidson distinguished between protest and intimidation, calling for leadership that protects expression while ensuring campus safety.

The episode surveyed specific pressure points that administrators will face this fall: repeat anti-Israel encampments, disruptions of Jewish programming, and the challenge of distinguishing political speech from conduct that violates university rules. “Unless schools draw those lines now,” Davidson warned, “they’ll be scrambling once the next crisis hits.”

Cohen closed by framing the discussion as a test of institutional credibility, asking whether universities will “turn policy into protection” in real time. Davidson agreed, pointing to students who “need to know the rules aren’t just on paper.”

The full conversation is available on The Algemeiner’s “J100” podcast.

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