Police officers block a street as pro-Palestinian demonstrators gather in protest against Britain’s Home Secretary Yvette Cooper’s plans to proscribe the “Palestine Action” group in the coming weeks, in London, Britain, June 23, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Jaimi Joy

British counter-terrorism police have arrested four people in connection with an anti-Israel protest last week in which military planes were sprayed with paint at an air base in England, authorities said on Friday.

A woman, 29, and two men aged 36 and 24, were arrested on suspicion of the commission, preparation, or instigation of acts of terrorism, while another woman, 41, was arrested on suspicion of assisting an offender, the police statement said.

Two activists from the Palestine Action group broke into the air base in Oxfordshire in central England on June 20, spraying red paint over two planes used for refueling and transport, and further damaging them with crowbars, an act that was condemned by Prime Minister Keir Starmer as “disgraceful.”

Within days of the incident, interior minister Yvette Cooper set out plans to use anti-terrorism laws to ban Palestine Action, saying its actions had become more aggressive and caused millions of pounds of damage.

Palestine Action has regularly targeted British sites connected to Israeli defense firm Elbit Systems and other companies in Britain linked to Israel since the start of the conflict in Gaza.

In response to Friday’s arrests, the campaign group accused authorities of “cracking down on non-violent protests which disrupt the flow of arms to Israel during its genocide in Palestine.”

The maximum sentence for preparation of terrorist acts, or to assist others in such preparation, in Britain is a life sentence. The government is also reviewing security across all defense sites.

Israel has repeatedly dismissed accusations that it is committing genocide in the war in Gaza which began when Hamas launched a surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing nearly 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking 251 others hostage into Gaza.

In response, Israel launched a military campaign aimed at freeing the hostages and dismantling Hamas’s military and governing capabilities.

The post UK Police Arrest Four Over Anti-Israel Protest, Vandalism at Air Base first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Candidate Zohran Mamdani speaks during a Democratic New York City mayoral primary debate, June 4, 2025, in New York, US. Photo: Yuki Iwamura/Pool via REUTERS

The recent political rise of Zohran Mamdani should alarm anyone who still believes in responsible governance, democratic values, and basic moral clarity.

Mamdani, a self-proclaimed socialist and member of the Democratic Socialists of America, represents a dangerous shift in New York City politics — and perhaps American politics more broadly. He has openly called to defund the police, abolish prisons, and dismantle ICE — positions that would undermine law, safety, and justice in a city already reeling from rising crime and instability.

Mamdani’s ascendance is not a sign of progress — it is a symptom of a political ecosystem that has lost control of its messaging, especially within the Democratic Party. This is not just about his radical policies. It’s about what his rhetoric signals.

Mamdani has a deeply troubling record of antisemitic statements, including his refusal to denounce the phrase “globalize the intifada” — a call that glorifies violence and terror. Worse still, he once outrageously compared that slogan to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, drawing an offensive and historically illiterate parallel between Jewish Holocaust resistance fighters and modern-day terrorist movements.

At a time when antisemitism is at record highs, Mamdani is not just out of step — he’s fanning the flames of hatred. And yet, rather than reject these radical stances, prominent Democrats have congratulated him. Both Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries offered public praise for Mamdani’s win — carefully avoiding full endorsements, but unmistakably signaling approval. Is this the new face of the Democratic Party? Do they now tacitly accept Mamdani’s vision of a city with no police, no prisons, no borders — and no Jewish state?

This isn’t progressivism. This is ideological extremism dressed up in slick TikTok clips and empty slogans. Mamdani may be skilled in digital storytelling and social media performance, but governing New York City requires more than charisma. It demands experience, competence, and the ability to manage the largest police department and fire department in the nation, as well as an economy that supports more than 8 million people. Mamdani has shown none of that.

His popularity stems not from viable policy, but from his ability to tap into widespread dissatisfaction, especially among young and marginalized voters who feel ignored by traditional politicians. He has cloaked his campaign in the language of revolution and representation — but beneath the surface is a political movement that offers no economic strategy, no solutions for crime or infrastructure, and no respect for historical truth or civic unity.

His socialism isn’t even the benign idealism of yesteryear — it’s a radical rejection of Western liberal democracy itself. Ask anyone who has fled socialism — Cuban dissidents, Soviet refugees, or Venezuelan exiles — and they will tell you: socialism may start with slogans, but it ends with broken economies, silenced voices, the murder of those who dissent, and collapsed societies.

The Democratic Party has failed to draw a clear moral and political line. It has lost control of its message, allowing extremists like Mamdani to become the loudest voices in the room. Instead of offering real solutions, they peddle emotional sloganeering, elevate performative radicals, and ignore the concerns of working-class, law-abiding citizens.

The Republican Party, meanwhile, has struggled to connect with urban voters or effectively counter this narrative. But the failure of one party does not excuse the collapse of another. America’s cities — and our democracy — deserve better than this binary of dysfunction.

If Democrats truly care about reclaiming their mantle as defenders of civil rights, public safety, and inclusive governance, they must distance themselves from figures like Zohran Mamdani. They must reject the romanticization of radicalism and return to a politics rooted in reality, responsibility, and respect for all communities — including Jewish Americans.

New York City is not a socialist experiment. It is a beacon of pluralism, culture, and resilience. We cannot allow it to be led by someone who believes in globalizing violent uprisings rather than building inclusive solutions. Those who yell into microphones and only get emotional when the cameras are on are not to be trusted — history has taught us that. Leadership requires more than performative outrage — it requires vision, empathy, the desire to unify communities, and the courage to fight bigotry instead of nourishing it.

Yuval David is an Emmy and Multi-Award-Winning Actor, Filmmaker, Journalist, and Jewish LGBTQ+ activist and advisor. A creative and compelling storyteller, on stage and screen, news and across social media, Yuval shares the narrative of Jewish activism and enduring hope. Follow him on Instagram, YouTube, and X.

The post When Performative Politics Replace Principles: The Rise of Zohran Mamdani and the Fall of Democratic Messaging first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

A man holds a laptop computer as cyber code is projected on him in this illustration picture taken on May 13, 2017. Photo: REUTERS/Kacper Pempel/Illustration

After Israeli and American forces struck Iranian nuclear targets, officials in both countries sounded the alarm over potentially disruptive cyberattacks carried out by the Islamic Republic’s hackers.

But as a fragile ceasefire holds, cyber defenders in the United States and Israel say they have so far seen little out of the ordinary – a potential sign that the threat from Iran’s cyber capabilities, like its battered military, has been overestimated.

There has been no indication of the disruptive cyberattacks often invoked during discussions of Iran’s digital capabilities, such as its alleged sabotage of tens of thousands of computers at major oil company Saudi Aramco in 2012, or subsequent break-ins at US casinos or water facilities.

“The volume of attacks appears to be relatively low,” said Nicole Fishbein, a senior security researcher with the Israeli company Intezer. “The techniques used are not particularly sophisticated.”

Online vigilante groups alleged by security analysts to be acting at Iran’s direction boasted of hacking a series of Israeli and Western companies in the wake of the airstrikes.

A group calling itself Handala Hack claimed a string of data heists and intrusions, but Reuters was not able to corroborate its most recent hacking claims. Researchers say the group, which emerged in the wake of Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, likely operates out of Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence.

Rafe Pilling, lead threat intelligence researcher at British cybersecurity company Sophos, said the impact from the hacking activity appeared to be modest.

“As far as we can tell, it’s the usual mix of ineffectual chaos from the genuine hacktivist groups and targeted attacks from the Iran-linked personas that are likely having some success but also overstating their impact,” he said.

Iran’s mission to the United Nations in New York did not respond to a request for comment. Iran typically denies carrying out hacking campaigns.

Israeli firm Check Point Software said a hacking campaign it ties to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards has in recent days sent phishing messages to Israeli journalists, academic officials and others.

In one case, the hackers tried to lure a target to a physical meeting in Tel Aviv, according to Sergey Shykevich, Check Point’s threat intelligence group manager. He added that the reasoning behind the proposed meeting was not clear.

Shykevich said there have been some data destruction attempts at Israeli targets, which he declined to identify, as well as a dramatic increase in attempts to exploit a vulnerability in Chinese-made security cameras – likely to assess bomb damage in Israel.

The pro-Iranian cyber operations demonstrate an asymmetry with pro-Israeli cyber operations tied to the aerial war that began on June 13.

In the days since the start of the conflict, suspected Israeli hackers have claimed to have destroyed data at one of Iran’s major state-owned banks. They also burned roughly $90 million in cryptocurrencies that the hackers allege were tied to government security services.

Israel’s National Cyber Directorate did not return a message seeking comment.

Analysts said the situation is fluid and that more sophisticated cyber espionage activity may be flying under the radar.

Both Israeli and US officials have urged industry to be on the lookout. A June 22 Department of Homeland Security bulletin warned that the ongoing conflict was causing a heightened threat environment in the US and that cyber actors affiliated with the Iranian government may conduct attacks against US networks.

The FBI declined to comment on any potential Iranian cyber activities in the United States.

Yelisey Bohuslavskiy, the cofounder of intelligence company Red Sense, compared Iran’s cyber operations to its missile program. The Iranian weapons that rained down on Israel during the conflict killed 28 people and destroyed thousands of homes, but most were intercepted and none significantly damaged the Israeli military.

Bohuslavskiy said Iranian hacking operations seemed to work similarly.

“There is a lot of hot air, there is a lot of indiscriminate civilian targeting, and – realistically – there are not that many results,” he said.

The post Iran’s Hackers Keep a Low Profile After Israeli and US Strikes first appeared on Algemeiner.com.