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‘An inflection point in history’: Biden says assisting Israel and Ukraine is necessary to preserve democracy
WASHINGTON (JTA) — President Joe Biden delivered a rare Oval Office address asking Americans to back assistance to Israel and Ukraine in the name of preserving democracy across the globe.
“We’re facing an inflection point in history,” Biden said Thursday in the roughly 15-minute address, delivered just hours after he returned from a lightning visit to Israel. He landed in Tel Aviv on Wednesday to show his support as the country wages war on Hamas, the terror group that invaded Israel on Oct. 7, killing 1,400, wounding thousands and taking more than 200 hostage.
“Hamas and Putin represent different threats,” Biden said, referring to the Russian president who launched an invasion of Ukraine last year. “But they share this in common. They both want to completely annihilate neighboring democracies.”
Hamas’ “purpose for existing is the destruction of the State of Israel and the murder of Jewish people,” he said.
Biden said he would ask Congress on Friday for more defense assistance for Israel and Ukraine. He said he wanted Israel to “sharpen” its qualitative military edge to deter Iran and others from joining Hamas in the war it launched from the Gaza Strip. He also wants to provide funding for Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system.
Congress has been stalled for weeks as the Republican majority in the U.S. House of Representatives has been unable to elect a speaker, without whom appropriations are impossible. Biden did not mention numbers, but reports have said he is set to ask for $60 billion for Ukraine and $14 billion for Israel.
Throughout the speech, Biden cast his plea for support as a vital American interest. “When terrorists don’t pay the price for their terror, when dictators don’t pay the price for their aggression, they keep going,” he said.
Biden described his meetings with Israelis who had survived the Oct. 7 invasion, and added that he urged Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to obey the laws of war. He noted his efforts to get humanitarian assistance into the Gaza Strip. Israel has launched counterattacks from the air and with artillery that have killed more than 3,700 Palestinians, and is readying for a ground invasion of Gaza.
Biden also spoke of the threat of antisemitism and islamaphobia in the United States now that the war is underway, mourning the murder of a Palestinian-American boy in a Chicago suburb.
“The Oct. 7 terror attacks have triggered deep scars and terrible memories in the Jewish community,” Biden said. “Today, Jewish families are worried about being targeted in school, wearing symbols of their faith walking down the street, or going out about their daily lives.”
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Israeli Strike on Tehran Kills Bodyguard of Slain Hezbollah Chief
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi lays a wreath as he visits the burial site of former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, on the outskirts of Beirut, Lebanon, June 3, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir
A member of Lebanese armed group Hezbollah was killed in an Israeli air strike on Tehran alongside a member of an Iran-aligned Iraqi armed group, a senior Lebanese security source told Reuters and the Iraqi group said on Saturday.
The source identified the Hezbollah member as Abu Ali Khalil, who had served as a bodyguard for Hezbollah’s slain chief Hassan Nasrallah. The source said Khalil had been on a religious pilgrimage to Iraq when he met up with a member of the Kataeb Sayyed Al-Shuhada group.
They traveled together to Tehran and were both killed in an Israeli strike there, along with Khalil’s son, the senior security source said. Hezbollah has not joined in Iran’s air strikes against Israel from Lebanon.
Kataeb Sayyed Al-Shuhada published a statement confirming that both the head of its security unit and Khalil had been killed in an Israeli strike.
Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli aerial attack on Beirut’s southern suburbs in September.
Israel and Iran have been trading strikes for nine consecutive days since Israel launched attacks on Iran, saying Tehran was on the verge of developing nuclear weapons. Iran has said it does not seek nuclear weapons.
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Hamas Financial Officer and Commander Eliminated by IDF in the Gaza Strip
Israeli soldiers operate during a ground operation in the southern Gaza Strip, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, July 3, 2024. Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg/Pool via REUTERS
i24 News – The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), in cooperation with the General Security Service (Shin Bet), announced on Friday the killing of Ibrahim Abu Shamala, a senior financial official in Hamas’ military wing.
The operation took place on June 17th in the central Gaza Strip.
Abu Shamala held several key positions, including financial officer for Hamas’ military wing and assistant to Marwan Issa, the deputy commander of Hamas’ military wing until his elimination in March 2024.
He was responsible for managing all the financial resources of Hamas’ military wing in Gaza, overseeing the planning and execution of the group’s war budget. This involved handling and smuggling millions of dollars into the Gaza Strip to fund Hamas’ military operations.
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Report: Wary of Assassination by Israel, Khamenei Names 3 Potential Successors
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei waves during a meeting in Tehran, Iran, May 20, 2025. Photo: Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
i24 News – Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei named three senior clerics as candidates to succeed him should he be killed, the New York Times reported on Saturday citing unnamed Iranian officials. It is understood the Ayatollah fears he could be assassinated in the coming days.
Khamenei reportedly mostly speaks with his commanders through a trusted aide now, suspending electronic communications.
Khamenei has designated three senior religious figures as candidates to replace him as well as choosing successors in the military chain of command in the likely event that additional senior officials be eliminated.
Earlier on Saturday Israel confirmed the elimination of Saeed Izadi and Bhanam Shahriari.
Shahriari, head of Iran’s Quds Force Weapons Transfer Unit, responsible for arming Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, was killed in an Israeli airstrike over 1,000 km from Israel in western Iran.
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