Israeli security forces said on Monday that they arrested a Palestinian man for allegedly killing a 14-year-old Israeli in the West Bank earlier this month in what authorities described as a terrorist attack.

Ahmed Dawabsha, 21, a resident of the West Bank town of Duma near Ramallah, was arrested overnight for his alleged involved in the murder of Benjamin Achimeir, who was found dead on April 13, a day after he went missing while herding sheep.

Dawabsha “implicated himself” in the April 12 attack near the West Bank outpost of Malachei Shalom during an interrogation, according to a joint statement from Israeli police, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), and the Shin Bet security agency.

The security forces led an “intelligence and operational effort in an attempt to trace the identity of the terrorist,” the statement added.

The Shin Bet said there had been significant developments in the investigation over the past day that led to the suspect’s arrest.

The post Palestinian Arrested for Murdering Israeli Teen in West Bank Terror Attack first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Relatives of Israeli hostages held in Gaza will mark the start of the Jewish holiday of Passover, a week-long festival that celebrates freedom, with a renewed plea to the government to make a deal to return their missing loved ones.

Passover, starting on Monday evening, is traditionally observed with a Seder, a holiday feast when families gather and celebrate the biblical account of the Israelites’ freedom from Egyptian slavery.

This year, many families in Israel are expected to leave empty seats at the table to represent those killed or taken hostage in the Hamas attacks of Oct. 7 last year.

Rachel Goldberg-Polin’s 23-year-old son Hersh was captured and taken to Gaza after his arm was blown off on Oct. 7 when Hamas terrorists attacked the Supernova music festival in southern Israel. She said this year’s Passover would be more profound than ever and urged the government to find a way to return the hostages.

“All of the symbolic things we do at the Seder will take on a much more profound and deep meaning this year,” Goldberg-Polin, a dual citizen of Israel and the United States, told reporters.

She would be participating in a Seder with friends and family, but they have been clear if they are unable to do it or “if 15 minutes in, we just can’t do it, and we need to cry, then we will cry.”

Hamas terrorists killed some 1,200 people and abducted another 253 in southern Israel on Oct. 7, triggering the war in Gaza.

EMPTY CHAIR

Some of the hostages were freed in a November truce, but efforts to secure another deal to release the remaining 133 captives appear to have stalled for now.

“As we gather around the Seder table to commemorate and celebrate our journey from slavery to freedom, our hearts are heavy with the plight of the 133 Israelis who remain in captivity in Hamas’ terror tunnels,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wrote on X on Monday.

“The days ahead will see increased military and diplomatic efforts to secure the freedom of our hostages … There is more to come. We will prevail.”

Netanyahu has repeatedly threatened a ground offensive to destroy remaining Hamas battalions in Gaza’s southern city of Rafah, the only part of the enclave where Israel has not sent in troops.

Israel‘s Hostage and Missing Family Forum, the organization representing most of the families of the hostages, urged families to place an empty chair at their Seder table with a portrait of a hostage.

Goldberg-Polin said she hoped for a ceasefire in Gaza, for the hostages to return, and an end to the “quagmire of misery and trauma.”

“Something that we need all of our leaders to be doing, all of them, is to make the decision to care about and love their own people more than they hate their enemies,” she said.

The post Israeli Hostage Families Make Passover Plea for Return of Missing Loved Ones first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

To mark six months of Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, Voice of America (VOA) released a three-minute video chronicling the effect that the war has had in both Israel and Gaza.

However, rather than provide its audience with a comprehensive overview of the war in Gaza, VOA produced a report that omitted a fair amount of context, ultimately leaving it heavily one-sided and uninformative.

The video report begins with recent Israeli protests calling for new elections, a hostage deal, and the ouster of the current government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.  Meanwhile, there have been no protests in Gaza to Hamas’ massacre of 1,200 Israelis on October 7. In fact, Hamas still has the support of the vast majority of Gazans.

In its coverage of the anti-Netanyahu protests, VOA claims that the Israeli government has been unable “so far to secure the release of hostages captured on October 7.”

This statement omits the fact that, in November 2023, more than 100 hostages were released during a temporary ceasefire in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.

This claim also makes it appear that the onus lies with Israel when, in fact, Israel has agreed to several deals that would see the release of more hostages from Hamas captivity, all of which have been rejected by the leadership of the Gaza-based terror group.

After profiling the Israeli protest movement, VOA then turns its attention to Gaza.

The report quotes the Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health, alleging that “more than 33,000 Palestinians” have been killed by Israel during the war.

However, the report fails to qualify this statistic with the vital context that the Gaza Ministry of Health does not differentiate between civilians and combatants — and that all the numbers are unverified. Hamas has even said it can’t provide full details for its claims.

Similarly, the report goes on to claim that “Israel’s widespread aerial attacks have leveled much of the civilian infrastructure in Gaza, creating a humanitarian crisis.”

This point is reiterated later on by World Central Kitchen head José Andrés, who is quoted as saying that Israel is “destroying every building, every hospital, every school, every university.”

Aside from these allegations being exaggerations of the reality on the ground, what is missing from this picture is the necessary understanding that Israel is combating Hamas’ terror infrastructure, which is purposefully embedded in civilian areas.

Further on in this video report, VOA claims that Netanyahu “remains steadfast in ignoring international calls for a humanitarian ceasefire until Hamas releases all hostages held,” later adding that “publicly, there remains no plan for an immediate ceasefire, hostage release or an end to hostilities.”

As mentioned earlier, these statements ignore the fact that Israel has okayed hostage agreements (including temporary ceasefires) that have been rejected by Hamas. Israel has also agreed to a ceasefire as part of an agreement in which the hostages are released in stages.

Aside from the fact that some of the main allegations made in this video report are missing a proper context, another issue with this overall report is the lack of focus on how the war has affected Israel.

Despite being titled “Israel marks 6 months since deadly Hamas attack,” the report is silent on the deadly cost of the war for Israeli society, the fact that Hamas and Hezbollah are still firing rockets at Israeli civilian centers in both the north and south, and the fact that there are still tens of thousands of internally displaced Israelis who are unable to return to their homes.

Israel has agreed in hostage negotiations in Egypt to concessions about the return of Palestinians to the north of Gaza, but believes Hamas does not want to strike a deal, Israeli officials said on Wednesday.https://t.co/J3vwyyOf25

— The Jerusalem Post (@Jerusalem_Post) April 10, 2024

If VOA truly wanted to provide its audience with a complete picture of the war between Israel and Hamas six months in, it would need to add more context to its allegations and provide a broader picture of the war, not just those aspects that can be used to besmirch Israel’s image.

The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.

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