i24 News – Two Israeli officers were seriously wounded and seven additional soldiers injured in two separate incidents in southern Lebanon, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said.

According to the military, the first incident occurred during the morning hours amid an encounter between Israeli forces and armed militants operating in the area.

During the engagement, an anti-tank missile was launched toward deployed troops, which the IDF said was fired by Hezbollah operatives. Two officers were struck in the attack, with one sustaining serious injuries and the second moderately wounded.

A second incident took place overnight in a separate sector of southern Lebanon, when Israeli forces operating in the area came under rocket fire. In that strike, one officer was seriously wounded and six soldiers were moderately injured, the IDF said.

The incidents come amid ongoing cross-border hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, marked by repeated exchanges of fire and periodic ground confrontations in southern Lebanon.

When former Congressman Matt Gaetz opened his speech by aligning with a Republican faction “loyal to only one nation,” his message to the Conservative Political Action Conference was clear: It was a veiled swipe at perceived Israeli influence over US politicians, even without naming Israel outright.

A month into the US-Israeli war with Iran, Gaetz’s comments struck a discordant note at the annual CPAC event. They cut against calls for unity and exposed a growing Republican rift largely along generational lines, as younger conservatives increasingly question support for Israel.

That skepticism reflects a broader distrust of military intervention among younger Republicans, fueled in part by conservative figures such as Tucker Carlson, whose allegations of excessive Israeli influence on US policy have drawn accusations that he is stoking antisemitism. Carlson has repeatedly denied accusations of antisemitism.

The Iran war, including Israel’s role in it, emerged as one of the main flashpoints at CPAC, which for decades has served as a central gathering for Republican politicians and activists.

Jack Posobiec, a conservative commentator and online influencer, said age 45 is a dividing line, with the younger cohort more likely to question the party’s steadfast support of Israel.

“People want to paint it off as if it’s antisemitism, but I don’t think that’s what it is,” Posobiec told Reuters. “It’s just a question of: Why? What is the purpose of this relationship? And I hear that a lot from young voters.”

The issue has roiled the Democratic Party in recent weeks, with some lawmakers and primary candidates distancing themselves from the pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC amid growing unease over Israel’s military actions.

It is now exposing fault lines among Republicans as well, turning off young voters who helped propel Trump to victory in 2024 and potentially complicating the party’s efforts to defend slim majorities in the Senate and House of Representatives heading into November’s midterm elections.

Noah Bundy, 17, and Ryder Gerrald, 18, conservative friends from Georgia attending their first CPAC, said they opposed the war with Iran and questioned whether the military operation put Israel’s interests ahead of America’s.

“I think they totally pushed us into a war with Iran,” Bundy said. “My whole family is military and none of us is really for it.”

“Our younger generation, we don’t like Israel as much compared to the older generation,” said Gerrald. He said he would prefer redirecting US taxpayer dollars toward domestic priorities, rather than spending to bolster Israel’s military.

EVANGELICAL SUPPORT FOR ISRAEL

The party’s pro-Israel stance, however, resonates strongly with evangelicals – a pillar of Trump’s political base – and with older voters like Harry Strine III, an 83-year-old CPAC attendee who was wearing a red “Make America Great Again” hat.

“Israel is God’s people,” Strine said. “The US was founded on the Judeo-Christian belief. I guess I’m a traditionalist.”

On the conference’s opening day, Rev. Franklin Graham said that, by striking Iran to protect Israel, President Donald Trump was like the biblical figure of Esther, a Jewish queen who, according to scripture, was elevated by God to save her people from annihilation in ancient Persia.

“I believe God has raised him up for a time such as this, like Queen Esther,” said Graham, a prominent Christian evangelist, invoking a core evangelical belief that the modern state of Israel represents the fulfillment of biblical prophecy.

But unease over the Iran war and rising gasoline prices has pushed Trump’s approval rating down to 36% – its lowest since his return to the White House – a Reuters/Ipsos poll completed on Monday found. Support among his core base remains strong, however, with 74% of Republicans backing the strikes on Iran.

The debate over Israel coincides with a broader Republican fight over the future of the MAGA movement and who belongs in it. Allegations of antisemitism flared at a December event organized by Turning Point USA, a nonprofit focused on promoting conservative politics. At its first national event since founder Charlie Kirk’s death, commentator Ben Shapiro criticized fellow conservatives for associating with figures like white nationalist streamer Nick Fuentes, who has praised Hitler.

In his CPAC speech on Thursday, Gaetz said he did not agree with Shapiro and other conservative commentators “that we have some sort of near slavish loyalty to a country in a faraway land,” an apparent reference to Israel.

He argued that conservatives needed to allow for disagreements and that “antisemitism isn’t hiding around every corner and in every bush.”

Visitors to the CPAC booth of Generation Zion, a nonprofit group that trains young Christians and Jews to advocate for Israel and to combat antisemitism, could pick up a sticker reading “Tucker Carlson Hates Me,” a rebuke of the commentator’s recent criticism of Christian Zionism and Israel’s alleged sway over U.S. politics.

Gabriel Khuly, a 19-year-old volunteer for the group, said that while the Republican Party has an antisemitism problem, it is driven by a small minority with an outsized voice online.

“The actual anti-Israel, antisemitic wing of the Republican Party, I think, makes itself seem a lot bigger than it really is.”

Thousands of rallies are expected across the United States on Saturday in the latest “No Kings” protest against the policies of President Donald Trump and his administration.

Organizers say that more than 3,200 events are planned in all 50 states for what they hope will be the largest single-day nonviolent protest in US history. The two previous No Kings events attracted millions of participants.

Flagship rallies will take place in New York, Los Angeles, Washington, and Minnesota’s Twin Cities, but two-thirds of participants are expected from outside major city centers, a nearly 40% jump for smaller communities from the movement’s first mobilization last June, organizers said.

“The defining story of this Saturday’s mobilization is not just how many people are protesting, but where they are protesting,” said Leah Greenberg, co-founder of Indivisible, the group that started the No Kings movement last year and led planning of Saturday’s events.

MARCHING AHEAD OF MIDTERMS

With midterm elections later this year in the US, organizers say they have seen a surge in the number of people organizing events and registering to participate in deeply Republican states like Idaho, Wyoming, Montana and Utah.

Competitive suburban areas that have helped decide national elections are seeing “huge” increases in interest, Greenberg said, citing as examples Pennsylvania’s Bucks and Delaware counties, East Cobb and Forsyth in Georgia, and Scottsdale and Chandler in Arizona.

“Voters who decide elections, the people who do the door knocking and the voter registration and all of the work of turning protests into power, they are taking to the streets right now, and they are furious,” she said.

White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson in a statement dismissed the rallies as “Trump Derangement Therapy Sessions” of interest only to journalists.

In northern Virginia just outside Washington, D.C., several hundred people began gathering on Saturday morning close to Arlington National Cemetery before a planned march across the Potomac River to the capital city’s National Mall.

Some passing drivers honked their horns in support but others slowed down to berate the protesters.

“You’re all idiots,” one man shouted from his car.

John Ale, 57, a retired air conditioning and heating contractor, said he drove 20 minutes from his home in Virginia to join the march.

“What’s happening in this country is unsustainable,” he said. “The middle class, the little people, can’t afford to live anymore. And he (Trump) is breaking the norms, the things that made us function as a country.”

A CALL TO ACTION AGAINST IRAN WAR

Saturday marked the third No Kings Day of Action. The movement launched last year on Trump’s birthday, June 14, and drew an estimated 4 to 6 million people spread across roughly 2,100 sites nationwide. The second mobilization in October involved an estimated 7 million participants across more than 2,700 cities, according to a crowd-sourcing analysis published by prominent data journalist G. Elliott Morris.

That October event was largely fueled by a backlash against a government shutdown, an aggressive crackdown by federal immigration authorities, and the deployment of National Guard troops to major cities.

Saturday’s events come amid what organizers said was a call to action against the bombardment of Iran by the US and Israel, a conflict that is now four weeks old.

Deirdre Schifeling, chief political and advocacy officer for the American Civil Liberties Union, said protests have led to tangible results.

“Whenever we stand up to President Trump’s abuses of power, like most bullies, he backs down,” she said, citing administration reversals following earlier demonstrations over National Guard deployments in Los Angeles and ICE killings of two American citizens in Minneapolis.