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Hamas Leader’s Killing Raises Fears of Wider War, Israel Keeps Up Campaign in Gaza

Israeli soldiers prepare shells near a mobile artillery unit, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Israel, Jan. 2, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen

Israeli forces kept up their military campaign in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday and told civilians to leave a refugee camp in the north of the Palestinian enclave after the war reached into Lebanon with the killing in Beirut of the Hamas deputy leader.

Israel has neither confirmed nor denied that it killed Saleh al-Arouri in a drone strike in the Lebanese capital on Tuesday. But military spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said Israeli forces were in a high state of readiness and prepared for any scenario.

The assassination was a further sign that the nearly three-month war between Israel and Hamas was spreading across the region, drawing in the West Bank, Hezbollah forces on the Lebanon-Israel border, and even Red Sea shipping lanes.

Arouri, 57, who lived in Beirut, was the first senior Hamas political leader to be assassinated since Israel began its offensive against the Palestinian terrorist group in response to its deadly rampage into Israeli towns on Oct. 7.

Hamas politburo member Hossam Badran said in a eulogy for Arouri: “We say to the criminal occupation [Israel] that the battle between us is open.”

Israel had long accused him of orchestrating attacks on its citizens. But a Hamas official said he was also “at the heart of negotiations” conducted by Qatar and Egypt over the outcome of the Gaza war and the release of Hamas-held Israeli hostages.

Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah was due to make a speech in Beirut later on Wednesday. Previously he had warned Israel against carrying out assassinations on Lebanese soil, vowing a “severe reaction.”

The heavily armed Hezbollah, a Hamas ally and an Iran-backed terrorist group, has been exchanging near-daily fire with Israel across Lebanon’s southern border since the Gaza war began. More than 100 Hezbollah fighters and two dozen civilians have been killed on Lebanese territory, as well as at least nine Israeli soldiers in Israel.

Following Arouri’s killing, the UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon said any escalation “could have devastating consequences for people on both sides of the border.”

In Cairo, Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi told a delegation from the US Congress that the priority was to secure a ceasefire in Gaza.

Sisi stressed the need to prevent the conflict from widening across the region, a presidency statement said.

The Israeli military said in its daily briefing that “intensive battles” with terrorists were continuing in Gaza on Wednesday in the southern city of Khan Younis. It has said previously it is trying to flush out Hamas leaders in the area.

Residents and Palestinian media said Israeli forces bombed Al-Nusseirat refugee camp in the northern part of the Hamas-ruled enclave overnight and into Wednesday.

Israeli planes also dropped leaflets on Al-Nusseirat ordering people to leave seven districts.

“You are in a dangerous combat area. The IDF is operating heavily in your area of residence. For your safety the IDF urge you to immediately evacuate this area,” the leaflets said.

Israeli war planes and tanks also stepped up attacks on the Al-Bureij refugee camp.

Hamas’ armed wing said it had killed 10 Israeli soldiers in fighting in Al-Bureij and hit five tanks and troop carriers. The Israeli military said the number of its soldiers killed since its first incursion into Gaza on Oct. 20 had reached 177.

The war was triggered by a cross-border Hamas assault on Israeli towns on Oct. 7 in which Israel says 1,200 people were killed and some 240 hostages taken back to Gaza.

Since then Israel has waged a campaign of air strikes and ground operations in Gaza with the goal of incapacitating Hamas.

Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said Arouri’s killing would “ignite another surge in the veins of resistance and the motivation to fight against the Zionist occupiers.”

Shortly before Arouri’s killing, Hamas’ paramount leader Ismail Haniyeh, who is also based outside Gaza, said the movement had delivered its response to an Egyptian-Qatari ceasefire proposal.

He reiterated that Hamas’ conditions entailed “a complete cessation” of Israel‘s offensive in exchange for further releases of hostages.

Israel believes 129 hostages remain in Gaza after some were released during a brief truce in late November and others were killed during air strikes and rescue or escape attempts.

Israel has vowed to keep fighting until it has wiped out Hamas but it is unclear what it plans to do with the enclave should it succeed, and where that leaves the prospect of an independent Palestinian state.

In Lisbon, the European Union’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the international community must impose a solution to the conflict because the two parties would never be able to reach an agreement.

“If this tragedy doesn’t end soon, the entire Middle East might end up in flames,” he said.

The post Hamas Leader’s Killing Raises Fears of Wider War, Israel Keeps Up Campaign in Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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French Jewish Students Forcibly Removed From Spanish Plane After Singing in Hebrew, Camp Director Arrested

A Vueling aircraft approaches landing at Josep Tarradellas Barcelona-El Prat Airport, as Vueling employees prepare for strike, in Barcelona, Spain, Nov. 2, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Nacho Doce

A group of 50 French Jewish students was forcibly removed from a plane in Valencia, Spain on Wednesday evening — reportedly for singing in Hebrew — in an incident that led to the arrest of their summer camp director.

The children, aged 10 to 15, are members of the Kineret Club — a summer camp for Jewish families run by the Matana charitable association — which had just concluded their trip in the coastal resort town of Sant Carles de la Ràpita, between Valencia and Barcelona.

According to local reports, the children were singing in Hebrew while boarding the plane to return home, which prompted a hostile response from the crew.

Witnesses say the group then stopped singing and quietly followed boarding instructions, but airport police still intervened and ordered them to disembark.

As the incident quickly escalated, the camp director was arrested after refusing to hand over the children’s cell phones when requested by staff.

Israel’s Minister of Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism, Amichai Chikli, condemned the incident in a post on X, accusing the airline of antisemitism and calling for a thorough investigation.

“In line with Hamas’s campaign of lies echoed by Al Jazeera, Haaretz, and others, we are seeing numerous severe antisemitic incidents recently; this is one of the most serious,” the Israeli official said.

However, the Spanish low-cost airline Vueling denied the allegations, insisting the incident was not related to religion but rather that the group was causing a disruption.

In a statement released on Thursday, the airline asserted that the group was removed because of its members’ “highly combative attitude that was putting the safety of the flight at risk.”

Vueling claimed that the group “mishandled emergency equipment and actively disrupted the mandatory safety demonstration,” ignoring “multiple warnings,” which prompted the crew to call airport police.

Other passengers on the plane who witnessed the incident reported that staff made antisemitic remarks toward the group, including one employee who allegedly referred to Israel as a “terrorist state.”

The Kineret Club announced it is taking legal action against the airline over what it called a “purely antisemitic act.” The organization also confirmed that the children are safe in a hotel and scheduled to return home tomorrow.

The World Jewish Congress condemned the incident in a post on X, urging authorities to take swift action.

“Singing in Hebrew is not illegal. Existing as a group of Jewish people together is not illegal. This needs to be taken seriously,” the statement read.

This latest incident comes amid a sharp rise in anti-Jewish hate crimes in Spain, where Israelis have faced harassment, intimidation, and even assault following the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

Spain has also been one of the harshest critics of the Jewish state since the start of the war in Gaza, mounting a sustained effort against Israel in international forums.

In the aftermath of the Oct. 7 atrocities, Spain halted arms shipments from its own defense companies to Israel and launched a diplomatic campaign to curb the country’s military response.

At the same time, several Spanish ministers in the country’s left-wing coalition government issued pro-Hamas statements and called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, with some falsely accusing Israel of “genocide.”

More recently, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez urged other members of the European Union to suspend the bloc’s free trade agreement with Israel over its military campaigns against Hamas in Gaza and the terrorist organization Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Last year, Spain officially recognized a Palestinian state, claiming the move was accelerated by the Israel-Hamas war and would help foster a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. At the time, Israeli officials condemned the decision as a “reward for terrorism.”

The post French Jewish Students Forcibly Removed From Spanish Plane After Singing in Hebrew, Camp Director Arrested first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Israel Denies Gaza ‘Famine’ Claims, Condemns Failed UN Food Distribution Efforts

Trucks carrying aid move, amid a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, Feb. 13, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Hussam Al-Masri

Israel has rejected claims that its military policies have triggered a famine in Gaza, describing such accusations as inaccurate, politically driven, and detached from reality.

The Israeli government has facilitated the entry of hundreds of aid trucks into Gaza, officials said this week, condemning international aid agencies for their alleged failure to distribute supplies. One senior security official told reporters on Tuesday that there is no famine in Gaza, pointing to over 950 truckloads of food, water, and medical supplies that are currently stalled at border crossings such as Kerem Shalom.

“We know the calorie value of each truck that enters, and how many people it is enough for,” the official said according to The Times of Israel.

Israel has assigned responsibility to the UN for logistical failures which may have caused a breakdown in aid distribution within Gaza.

According to the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), the Israeli military and Defense Ministry body responsible for coordinating aid deliveries to Gaza, said the stockpiled aid in the enclave could sustain the population for over two weeks if properly distributed.

“The bottleneck isn’t on our side,” the official said. “The aid is there. It’s the UN and its partners who aren’t moving it.”

The official added, “We have not identified starvation at this current point in time, but we understand that action is required to stabilize the humanitarian situation.”

Israel has argued that false claims of mass starvation are being amplified by the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, which has ruled Gaza for nearly two decades, and international humanitarian organizations to manipulate global opinion. The Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry claims, without evidence, that more than 100 people have died from malnutrition in the beleaguered enclave. Israeli officials emphasize that these figures are unverified and may be inflated for propaganda purposes.

Western-backed attempts to bypass Hamas, such as the US-supported Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), have served Palestinians in Gaza over the past few months. However, tragic incidents, including tramplings and occasional gunfire, have killed hundreds of Palestinians attempting to obtain aid at one of GHF’s four distribution sites. Hamas has accused Israel of shooting Palestinian civilians at aid distribution sites. Israel has denied these unverified claims.

The GFH has called on the UN to publicly condemn the killing of aid workers in Gaza by Hamas and to collaborate in order to provide relief to the enclave’s population, accusing the UN of perpetuating a “vast disinformation campaign” aimed at tarnishing the US- and Israel-backed foundation’s image.

Despite the difficulties, the program is seen by Israeli and US officials as a more accountable and secure system than aid distributed through traditional UN agencies, which Israeli investigations have revealed as hotbeds of corruption and infiltration by Hamas operatives.

Nonetheless, international pressure is building on Israel to ramp up aid distribution. However, Israel argues that the international community fails to account for Hamas’s tactics, including documented cases of aid theft and interference with humanitarian workers.

On Wednesday, the Israel Defense Force (IDF) published footage showing five Hamas fighters smiling while eating an assortment of fruits and rice, casting doubt over allegations of a famine in the Gaza Strip. The IDF also released additional recordings from Gaza showing thousands of aid pallets waiting for UN distribution.

“Israel is not preventing the entry of aid trucks or humanitarian shipment into the Gaza. The aid is already across the fence inside the Gaza Strip, ready for distribution, but the UN chooses to slander Israel instead of delivering the food, which now sits idle and rotting,” the Israeli Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

The post Israel Denies Gaza ‘Famine’ Claims, Condemns Failed UN Food Distribution Efforts first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Hungary Bans Anti-Israel Irish Band Kneecap for Three Years Citing National Security Concerns

Members of Kneecap pose on the red carpet at the Irish Film and Television Academy (IFTA) Awards in Dublin, Ireland, Feb. 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Clodagh Kilcoyne

Hungary has banned members of the Irish rap trio Kneecap from entering the country for three years ahead of their scheduled performance at a major music festival, due to national security concerns surrounding what critics have decried as the band’s antisemitic hate speech and their alleged support for Hamas and Hezbollah.

The Belfast-based band is scheduled to perform on the closing day of the Sziget Festival in Budapest on Aug. 11. Kneecap has stirred controversy recently for a series of anti-Israel comments and a band member’s alleged support for Hamas and Hezbollah, which are proscribed terrorist organizations in the United Kingdom and United States. Kneecap has denied support for both Iran-backed Islamist terror groups.

Hungary’s immigration authority, the National Directorate-General for Aliens Policing, announced in a Hungarian-language degree on Thursday that Kneecap members Naoise Ó Cairealláin, J.J. Ó Dochartaigh, and Liam Óg ÓhAnnaidh are banned from entering Hungary for three years because their “entry and stay constitute a serious threat to national security.”

Zoltan Kovacs, Hungary’s secretary of state for international communications, further explained in an English-language social media post on Thursday that Kneecap cannot enter Hungarian territory due to their history supporting “antisemitism and glorifying terror.” Kovacs added, “Granting them a stage normalizes hate and terror, and puts democratic values on the line.”

Kneecap’s members “repeatedly engage in antisemitic hate speech supporting terrorism and terrorist groups” and Hungary “has zero tolerance for antisemitism in any form,” he continued. “Their planned performance posed a national security threat, and for this reason, the group has been formally banned from Hungary for three years. If they enter, expulsion will follow under international norms.”

Hungarian authorities — including Hungary’s Minister for European Affairs János Bóka – members of Hungary’s music industry, and others have been pressuring organizers of the Sziget Festival for some time to cancel the band’s performance because of their comments and behavior, characterizing them as antisemitic. Sziget Festival organizers said in a statement they think the decision to ban Kneecap from Hungary is “unnecessary and regrettable” and may “not only damage the reputation of Sziget, but also negatively affect Hungary’s standing worldwide.”

“Sziget Festival’s values mean we condemn hate speech, while guaranteeing the fundamental right to artistic freedom of expression for every performer,” they added. “Cancel culture and cultural boycotts are not the solution.”

Since Kneecap displayed anti-Israel messaging on stage at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in California in April, two major music festivals in Germany canceled the band’s performances, and their performances were also canceled at the Eden Project concert series and the TRNSMT festival – both in the UK. Kneecap was further dropped from its US booking agency, and television personality Sharon Osbourne called for their US visas to be revoked.

The Hungarian government has been a vocal supporter of Israel in recent months, going against much of the rest of Europe, which has grown increasingly critical of the Jewish state over its military campaign against Hamas terrorists in Gaza.

In April, Hungary’s parliament approved the country’s decision to withdraw from the International Criminal Court (ICC) because of its “political” stance against Israel and the Jewish state’s military actions during its war against Hamas terrorists in the enclave responsible for the massacre in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

The post Hungary Bans Anti-Israel Irish Band Kneecap for Three Years Citing National Security Concerns first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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