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Hamas Urges Arson as Wildfires Grip Israel on Memorial Day

Israeli security and rescue personnel work near Latrun in central Israel, as wildfires due to extreme heat and winds broke out in central Israel, April 30, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Oren Ben Hakoon

As wildfires swept through the Jerusalem hills and a national emergency was declared, Israel on Wednesday observed its annual Memorial Day for fallen soldiers and victims of terror with nationwide sirens, official ceremonies, and moments of silence.

Hamas posted a message on Telegram on Wednesday afternoon urging Palestinians in Jerusalem and elsewhere to “burn whatever you can of groves, forests, cars, and settler homes,” to seek “revenge” for Gaza.

At 8 pm on Tuesday evening, a minute-long siren sounded across Israel, signaling the beginning of Yom HaZikaron, which commemorates soldiers killed in battle and victims of terrorism since the state’s founding in 1948. Israelis stopped in their tracks, cars halted on highways, and heads bowed in memory. The scene repeated itself with another siren, this time for two minutes, the following day at 11 am.

Israelis stand for a moment of silence as the memorial siren sounds on Israel’s Memorial Day. Photo: Meir Pavlovsky, OneFamily

As the country paid tribute to the fallen, large brushfires burned through forests and communities west of Jerusalem. Fanned by high winds, the fires led to evacuations in several areas and the temporary closure of Route 1, the main highway between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. The Defense Ministry declared a national emergency and urged the public to avoid military cemeteries. The military was deployed to assist firefighting teams. The blazes come just a week after another in the area consumed nearly 3,000 acres of forest and open land.

Three people were arrested on suspicion of arson, including a 50-year-old resident of Jerusalem’s Umm Tuba neighborhood who was accused of helping ignite the fires near the city. Police said he was caught trying to set fire to vegetation in southern Jerusalem and was apprehended after a short chase. Officers found a lighter, cotton wool, and other flammable materials on him.

Commander of the Jerusalem District Fire and Rescue Services Shmulik Friedman, who ordered the evacuation of six communities in the area, said authorities were possibly facing “the largest wildfire the country has ever seen” that was set to get worse as wind speeds climbed above 60 miles per hour.

Israel’s Transportation Minister Miri Regev canceled the evening’s torch-lighting ceremony, traditionally held at Mount Herzl to open Independence Day, due to the advancing fires

Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar contacted his counterparts in Cyprus, Croatia, Italy, and Greece to request aerial firefighting assistance. It was not immediately clear whether any of the countries would respond.

At the state ceremony for victims of terror at Mount Herzl, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was met with heckling from protesters calling for his resignation. Cries of “You are the head, you are guilty” and “The hostages are suffering, bring them home now” interrupted his address.

Netanyahu praised the sacrifices of Israeli soldiers who, he said, “smashed the vice of our enemies.”

Referring to the 1948 War of Independence, he added: “The rebirth of Israel, unfortunately, was bought with pain and blood.” Netanyahu also condemned Palestinian incitement, saying, “The children of our enemies drink this poisonous fanaticism with their mother’s milk in kindergartens, in textbooks, in religious classes, in inciting sermons, in religious rulings that call for our destruction. But we will not allow them to destroy us because our life force is stronger than their force of death and destruction.”

President Isaac Herzog also addressed the audience, referencing the hostages held in Gaza and the broader obligations of Israeli society. “Our covenant with those who have died obligates us to support the soldiers of the IDF and all security forces — whether those performing national service, career soldiers, and reservists — and to care for those wounded in terror attacks and Israel’s wars,” he said.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog. Photo: Israeli Government Press Office (GPO)

In Jerusalem, more than 1,000 people attended the annual ceremony of OneFamily, Israel’s largest organization supporting terror victims and their families. Among those who spoke were siblings mourning lost brothers. “Being a bereaved twin is walking through this world split in half, knowing that part of your soul is no longer among the living,” said Itamar Weisel, whose twin brother Master Sgt. Elkana Weisel was killed in Gaza in January 2024. Daniel Oren, whose triplet brother Aviel Oren was killed at the Nova music festival during Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, also spoke of daily grief and remembrance.

L-R: Daniel Oren, whose triplet brother Aviel Oren, and Itamar Weisel, whose twin brother Master Sgt. Elkana Weisel was killed in Gaza, deliver speeches at the OneFamily memorial ceremony in Jerusalem on the evening of April 29, 2025. Photo: Meir Pavlovsky, OneFamily

An English-language ceremony was held at the Museum of Tolerance Jerusalem in partnership with the IDF Widows and Orphans Organization, attended by former Mossad chief Yossi Cohen, UN Ambassador Danny Danon, and other dignitaries. Cohen used the occasion to highlight the Iranian threat, saying it was “not just a strategic challenge, but a moral one.”

Israel “must do everything in its power — diplomatically, politically, and if necessary, operationally — to ensure that Iran never acquires nuclear weapons,” the former spy chief said.

“Just as our fallen stood bravely against danger, so too must we stand resolute against those who threaten the very existence of our nation,” Cohen added. 

Still in Jerusalem, around 3,000 people attended an unusual memorial ceremony for ultra-Orthodox soldiers who served in IDF tracks designated for Haredi recruits. The event occurred amid renewed debate over a law to expand Haredi conscription, which remains a politically divisive issue. While the IDF issued about 10,000 conscription orders to eligible Haredi men over the past year, only 2 percent have reported for service. Extremist factions in the Haredi community have at times staged violent protests against the draft, targeting police and recruiters.

Another annual memorial event that often draws controversy was held in Jaffa, jointly organized by Combatants for Peace and the Parents Circle – Families Forum, and attended by bereaved Israelis and Palestinians.

In Hurfeish, a Druze village in northern Israel, hundreds gathered at the local military cemetery to remember fallen soldiers from the community. Diana Zoher Rabah, whose father was killed while serving in the Israel Defense Forces in 1994, said, “Every soldier who is killed brings up fresh memories.” Two Druze soldiers from the village, Anwar Serhan and Jawad Amer, were killed during the current war. “We have lived with this pain for 30 years, and I know what they will go through for the next 30 years,” Rabah said.

At the same event, Jerusalem Affairs Minister Meir Porush addressed recent violence in Syria involving the Druze community. “We will make sure that nobody hurts the Druze in Syria,” he said. More than a dozen people were killed this week in fighting between pro-regime Sunni militias and Druze residents near Damascus. Half of those killed were from the Druze community. Porush also recalled the July attack in Majdal Shams, where 12 Druze children were killed by Hezbollah rockets. 

“The Druze give so much to this nation,” Porush said.

The Druze community has long been recognized for its loyalty to the state, with most serving in the IDF and national service. Sara Bisan, a Druze teenager from the national service told The Algemeiner from Auschwitz on Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day last week that “serving the state of Israel is an honor and a privilege.”

The post Hamas Urges Arson as Wildfires Grip Israel on Memorial Day first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Antisemitic Incidents Spiked in UK After Bob Vylan’s ‘Death to the IDF’ Chants at Glastonbury

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

There was a recorded rise in antisemitic incidents in the United Kingdom the day after the English punk rap duo Bob Vylan called for the death of Israeli soldiers at the Glastonbury Festival in June, according to the Community Security Trust (CST), a nonprofit charity that advises Britain’s Jewish community on security matters.

CST on Wednesday published a new report detailing antisemitic incidents recorded from January to June 2025. The report stated that the highest daily total for such outrages in the first half of 2025 was 26 reported on June 29, 16 of which took place online.

On June 28, Bob Vylan vocalist Pascal Robinson-Foster led thousands in the audience to chant “Death, Death to the IDF,” referring to the Israel Defense Forces, during the band’s set at the Glastonbury music and arts festival in Somerset, England. The performance was livestreamed by the BBC.

CST said the 26 incidents reported to the charity on June 29 involved “anti-Jewish responses” to events at Glastonbury, and CST’s statement on X that described Bob Vylan’s anti-IDF chants as “utterly chilling” and “an expression of mass hatred.”

The second worst day for “anti-Jewish hatred” in the first half of the year was May 17, when 19 incidents were recorded just a day after Israel announced the expansion of its military operation in the Gaza Strip, according to CST’s new report.

“In all of these incidents, anti-Jewish language, motivation, or targeting was evident alongside the rhetoric linked to Israel or Zionism,” CST said. “Both of these cases [on June 29 and May 17] illustrate how sentiment and rhetoric towards Israel and Zionism influence, shape, and drive contemporary anti-Jewish discourse, online and offline, often around totemic events that grab mainstream public attention.”

Because of their anti-IDF comments, Bob Vylan was dropped by their talent agency, as well as festivals and concerts worldwide. The duo also had their US visas revoked, and police in the UK launched an investigation to see if the band’s anti-IDF comments are a criminal offense.

The BBC apologized for broadcasting Bob Vylan’s “offensive and deplorable behavior” in their Glastonbury performance, during which Robinson-Foster also complained about working for a “f—king Zionist” and chanted “Free, free Palestine.”

According to Wednesday’s report, the CST recorded 1,521 antisemitic incidents in the UK from January to June of this year. It marks the second-highest total of incidents ever recorded by CST in the first six months of any year, following the first half of 2024 in which 2,019 antisemitic incidents were recorded in the aftermath of the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, terror attack on Israel.

Fifty-one percent of all antisemitic incidents in the first half of this year “referenced or were linked to Israel, Palestine, the Hamas terror attack (on Oct. 7, 2023) or the subsequent outbreak of conflict,” CST noted. The group also recorded 73 antisemitic assaults in the first half of the year – with an additional three physical attacks categorized as “extreme violence” – and 572 cases of online antisemitism.

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Members of IDF’s New Ultra-Orthodox Brigade Complete Combat Training

Members of the Hasmonean Brigade during their beret ceremony at the Western Wall on Aug. 6, 2024. Photo: Screenshot

The first set of troops from the Israel Defense Force’s new ultra-Orthodox Hasmonean Brigade completed seven months of basic and advanced training on Wednesday morning, when they received their dark blue berets during a ceremony at the Western Wall in Jerusalem.

“The army and the Torah go together, shoulder to shoulder. One strengthens the other, ” Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Chairman Boaz Bismuth wrote in a post on X, congratulating the troops. “I bless the ‘Hasmonean’ Brigade – the first ultra-Orthodox brigade in the IDF, which completed its training course today and, in an emotional ceremony at the Western Wall, received their beret. Only together will we triumph.”

Opposition Leader Yair Lapid also congratulated the troops, saying that “there is nothing more Jewish than defending the land of Israel.”

Israel’s Minister of Innovation, Science, and Technology Gila Gamliel added in a post on X that troops in the Hasmonean Brigade are “paving the way for combining faith with courage.”

“You are a symbol of dedication, mission, and contribution to the nation, and you light the path for all of us toward Israel’s unity,” she added. “Your brigade is proof that one can preserve identity while defending the homeland.”

The beret ceremony on Wednesday morning was attended by Shin Bet director and Maj. Gen. David Zini, who was crucial in the creation of the brigade, and brigade commander Col. Avinoam Emunah. Fifty ultra-Orthodox troops did a “beret march” that started in the hills of Jerusalem and ended at the Western Wall Plaza in the Old City of Jerusalem before the start of the ceremony. They blew shofars and sang songs calling for the rebuilding of the Jewish Temple, according to Israel’s Arutz 7.

Members of the brigade live a Haredi lifestyle both inside and outside the army and are given special accommodations, such as at least an hour of learning Talmud every day. Around 2,700 Haredim, or ultra-Orthodox Jews, have joined the army over the past year, according to Israeli media reports.

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UK’s Royal Ballet and Opera Cancels Israel Production After Staff Members Protest

The Royal Ballet perform in a general rehearsal of “Dark with Excessive Bright” at the Royal Opera House in London, Britain, Feb. 9, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Toby Melville

The Royal Ballet and Opera has canceled a performance of Giacomo Puccini’s “Tosca” at the Israeli Opera in Tel Aviv scheduled for next year after 182 anti-Israel RBO staff members signed an open letter protesting the planned performance and the organization’s support of Israel.

“We have made the decision that our new production of ‘Tosca’ will not be going to Israel,” RBO Chief Executive Alex Beard said in an internal message to staff, cited by The Guardian. He also reportedly mentioned the open letter signed anonymously by RBO staff members that was sent to him and the board on Friday.

The website of the Israeli Opera no longer includes any references to the RBO, but performances of “Tosca” are still listed for July 2026. The Royal Ballet and Opera is based at the Royal Opera House in London’s Covent Garden and is supported by a cast of more than 3,000 employees, according to its website.

In an open letter published by Artists for Palestine UK on Monday, RBO staff members said they “reject any current or future performances in Israel” and are committed to “withholding our productions from institutions that legitimize and economically support a state engaged in the mass killing of civilians.” They further condemned RBO’s decision to have a production of “Turandot” by Giacomo Puccini at the Israeli Opera this year. “The decision cannot be viewed as neutral. It is a deliberate alignment, materially and symbolically, with a government currently engaged in crimes against humanity,” said staff members – including dancers, singers, musicians, and backstage crew.

They then claimed that the Israeli Opera offers free tickets to Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers. The RBO “is clearly making a strong political statement by allowing its production and intellectual property to be presented in a space that openly rewards and legitimizes the very forces responsible for the daily killings of civilians in Gaza,” the letter stated.

Staff members demanded that the RBO “withholds our productions from institutions that legitimize and economically support a state engaged in the mass killing of civilians.” They also condemned RBO’s “silence on Israel’s genocidal conduct” and expressed solidarity with a performer who last month raised a Palestinian flag during the curtain call of “Il trovatore” at the Royal Opera House. The staff members said the performer displayed “courage and moral clarity on our very stage.”

Video footage from the incident showed RBO’s Director of Opera Oliver Mears trying to seize the flag from the performer in front of a live, applauding audience. The open letter said Mears’ actions “sent a clear message that any visible solidarity with Palestine would be met with hostility, while the organization remains silent on the ongoing genocide.” They called for Mears “to be held accountable for his public display of aggression,” and demanded that the RBO “publicly acknowledge the genocide in Gaza” and “end its silence” regarding Israel’s actions.

“History will remember the choices we make in times of atrocity. We urge our organization not to be complicit through inaction or false neutrality,” they stated in conclusion.

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